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PLANTING 
THE OUTPOSTS 



i'ratarick Sulzer 




Book >_2>1A3 

Copyright N° 

COPYRIGHT DEPOSIT. 



IOCERT FREDERICK SULZER. 



Planting the Outposts 

Thirty-Five Years 
Among the Children of the Plains 



ROBERT FREDERICK SULZER 

DUtricl Superintendent ol Prc»byterian Sunday-School Miasioni 
for Minneiota and North Dakota 



WITH ILLUSTRATIONS 




Philadelphia 

The Prcthylerian Board of Publication and 

Sabbath School Work 






Copyright, 1913, by the Trustees of 

The Presbyterian Board of Publication and 

Sabbath-School Work 



A350762 
^5/ 



To the many faithful coworkers and the boys and the 

girls in the Sunday schools of the Northwest 

who have made this work possible 

Cbie Volume 

Is affectionately dedicated 



CONTENTS 

RD vi. 

■oRTRAI rS OF ROBER I I . SULZER 

I H"v. Hj . His Service, by David James 

:. D.D, I.l. I) 3 

II. A Fellow Worker's Testimony, by R. \\ 

Adam-. I) I) i I 

III. The Man Who Saved a Collece. by Rev. 

A. W. Wrigfal 13 

CHAPTER I 

Early Lipr 17 

• II 

25 

CHAPTER III 

R MI ROAOIM M 

ITER IV 

41 

CH MTi.k v 



CHAP1 BR VI 



vi CONTENTS 

CHAPTER VII 

Pioneer Hospitality 73 

CHAPTER VIII 

The Personal Touch 87 

CHAPTER IX 

The Weak Become Strong 99 

CHAPTER X 

Infidelity on the Run in 

CHAPTER XI 

The Lord's Measure 123 

APPENDIX 

I. The Work of Twenty-Five Years 131 

II. Letters of Congratulation 131 



FOREWORD 

i at last yield to the many requests that have 
come to me for a number of years from personal 
friends and leading Sunday-school workers to 
write from memory a little of my life and experi- 
ence. When the Lord called me to this work I 
thought 1 was not qualified for it. but he closed 
up every other avenue and compelled me to make 
the work of a pioneer Sunday-school missionary 
my life work. Whatever 1 have been able to ac- 
complish has been possible only through the hearty 
ration of the workers whom the Lord has 
directed me to set at work. 

While we all recognize that higher education is 
one of the most essential things in life, and espe- 
cially in the ministry, yet the Lord can use men 
of limited education, but who are consecrated and 

nnnon sense, to accomplish some of the 

work that he has foreordained to be done in the 

• work of saving the children. 1 hope this 

little book will stimulate many young men and 

women, who feel that they have not sufficient edu- 
m and training for God's service, to take up 

the work, trust in God and go forward. 

k. 1 



ril 



PEN PORTRAITS 

OF 

ROBERT F. SULZER 



I. 

HOW HE BEGAX HIS SERVICE 

By David James Burrell, D.D., LL.D., 

Pastor of the Marble Collegiate Reformed Church, New 
York City 

In the summer of 1887 I had charge of an As- 
sembly at Clear Lake, Iowa. A good many ques- 
tions were ably discussed, for the most part by 
ministers; but there was one layman whose words 
were particularly to the point. He was a mission- 
ary in the employ of the American Sunday School 
Union, a homespun sort of man, with a German 
burr on his tongue and a quaint way of putting 
things that never failed to interest us. I pres- 
ently sought him out and invited him to my cot- 
tage, where we passed many pleasant hours to- 
gether. This was the beginning of my acquaint- 
ance with Robert F. Sulzer; and among the many 
friends of these thirty-five years none has been 
more beloved than he. 

At the close ol that Assembly I joined him in a 
hunting trip. On the evening of the first da\ pre 
came in sight of a schoolhouse with its win-low. 
lighted Up. He then confided to me that there 

a meeting Cor the organisation of a Sun- 
day school, h turned out later that he had can- 
■ ! the whole neighborhood, lome dayi previ- 



4 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

ously, and had invited the farmers and their fam- 
ilies to come and hear me preach. I demurred, 
but there was no getting out of it. Robert F. 
Sulzer never gives up. He has mastered the art 
of ultimate arrival. I preached, accordingly, in my 
hunting clothes. The schoolhouse was literally 
packed with people and there were others looking 
in at the windows. At the conclusion of the ser- 
mon Mr. Sulzer rose quietly and locked the door. 
Then I witnessed an order of procedure not laid 
down in Cushing's Manual or anywhere else. It 
revealed to me the secret of the man's power and 
of his singular success. He spoke to the people, 
as nearly as I can remember, in about this way: 
"I have heard that this is a godless community 
and I am inclined to believe it. Some of you were 
brought up in Christian homes; but that was so 
long ago that you have almost forgotten it. You 
haven't a church within ten miles and you don't 
care. You haven't even a Sunday school; so that 
your boys and girls are growing up in sin and 
ignorance and are going straight to the Devil if 
you don't look out. It doesn't make so much dif- 
ference for you gray-haired pagans; but you ought 
to be ashamed and sorry for your children. Are 
you going to keep right on living this way, or 
would you like a change? It's never too late to 
mend. You thought I invited you here to listen to 
a man preach; but that wasn't it. He has told you 
that you ought to be Christians, and that you must 
be if you expect to go to heaven; but I'm here to 
help you take the first step. We're going to have 



PEN PORTRAITS 5 

a Sunday school in this neck of the woods; and 
we're going to start in right now. You can't get 
out of the schoolhouse till you've organized it. At 
ten o'clock next Sunday be on hand with your 
children in your best Sunday clothes. The bell 
won't ring, because there isn't any bell. 

"But first we must organize; and to begin with 
we want a superintendent. Go on and nominate 
somebody. (A pause; with evident amusement.) 
Any Christian man will do. Is there a Scotchman 
here, who once learned 'The Lord's my shepherd, 
I'll not want' at his mother's knee? (Good-natured 
laughter, with side glancings and pointings at one 
and another of the older men.) What's that? (No- 
body had said a word.) 'Mr. McDougall?' Just 
the man! Mr. McDougall is nominated. All in 
favor say aye. Mr. McDougall you are superin- 
tendent of the Sunday school. Be on hand next 
Sunday at ten. Now we want a secretary; some 
bright young man who knows his a, b, abs and 
can write a bit. Ah, 'Harry Landis' did I hear 
you say? (Glances at the embarrassed youth, with 
laughter at his expense.) Harry is nominated. 
Those in favor say aye. Harry, you're it. Next 
Sunday be here promptly at ten with a pencil and 
scratch-block. Now for an organist. What's that? 
You say 'there's no organ here'? Correct; but 
I'll see that there is one. (And he did.) Now 
name one of your sweet young ladies who knows 
a cabinet organ from a jews-harp. 'Mary Ellis/ 
Fine; Miss Ellis is nominated. Anybody vote 
against her? Mary, I congratulate you on your 



6 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

popularity. One thing more; we want a librarian; 
for there'll be a lot of picture papers to distribute 
here next Sunday and if the school lasts till Christ- 
mas I'll see that you have a library. Now, who'll 
take care of it? Better name one of the best 
mothers you have; a good housewife who knows 
how to take care of things. Thank you: 'Mrs. 
Elmendorff.' She's the elect lady. Now the Sun- 
day school is organized and under way. Don't 
forget ; next Sunday at ten. Bring your luncheon 
if you want to. I'll not be here; but the Sunday 
after look out for me: and as like as not we'll 
have another sermon, if you say so. Do you say 
so? Hold up your hands. (Every hand up.) Now 
the Lord bless the new school and every one of 
you. . Let us pray." 

The Sunday school thus founded presently de- 
veloped into a church; and it is a well-equipped 
and self-sustaining church to-day. Since then I 
have seen much and heard more of Robert F. 
Sulzer's way of doing things. His methods are 
out of the ordinary, but I have never known them 
to offend. His sense of humor is contagious and 
always carries him through. He makes people 
smile, but he makes them cry. too. His hand- 
shake is an open sesame to the hearts of those 
who do not like his religion. His homely prayer 
breaks down prejudice. His frank address is 
captivating and his blood earnestness is proof of 
his sincerity. He has lived for many years in the 
neighborhood of a college, but he never went 
through it. He has earned his only titular degree 



PEN PORTRAITS 7 

in the University of Christian Work. I never knew 
a more tactful man: and I have seen him more 
than once at close quarters with the enemy. He 
conquers by the strategy of love. 

I am reminded of a letter I received, more than 
twenty-five years ago, from a colporteur of the 
Presbyterian Board of Publication and Sabbath 
School Work, saying that he had been instructed 
to canvass my parish in Dubuque for the sale of 
the Board's books and tracts. It seemed to me 
a foolish thing to peddle the Board's publications 
in a city with a population of twenty-five thousand 
and full of bookstores. I wrote the secretary ac- 
cordingly, asking him to head the man off. This 
was not done, however; and in due time the col- 
porteur arrived with a raw-boned horse and wagon. 
He advised me that he was acting under instruc- 
tions and must proceed to canvass the city; he 
thought this would require two or three weeks, 
adding that, as his salary was small, he would need 
to be entertained. Thereupon I gave him a letter 
to one of my elders, a bookseller by the way, ask- 
ing him to find a suitable boarding house and have 
the bill sent to me. As the colporteur was leaving 
he read the note and, returning, said, "This is all 
right, as far as it goes; but how about my beast?" 
I added a postscript requesting my elder to find 
accommodations for his ramshackle horse — which 
looked as if it needed a whole crop of oats in about 
a minute — saying that I would foot the bill. The 
same night, after prayer meeting, I asked the elder 
whether he had made the desired provisions for 



8 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

man and beast and his answer was: "Indeed I 
did. I told him Dubuque was no place for him 
and that my pastor was a fool. He's gone." 

That set me thinking; and before I was through 
with it I came to the conclusion that the method 
of carrying on frontier work was superannuated 
and ineffective. The whole colporteur system was 
behind the times; and unfortunately home missions 
were involved in it. We were planting churches 
without rime or reason, in places that appeared 
to be destitute; but without knowing whether 
those churches were really needed or were likely 
to live. And we had no satisfactory means of find- 
ing out. A good many of our western ministers 
had expressed themselves in like manner; but the 
Well-meaning, poorly equipped and ineffective col- 
porteurs kept right on serving as the vanguard 
of home missions in the Presbyterian Church of 
the United States of America. And meanwhile the 
American Sunday School Union was doing splen- 
did work throughout the West, supported most 
largely by Presbyterian contributions, planting 
Sunday schools which often developed into "union 
churches," but rarely enrolled under the Presby- 
terian name. The other denominations had all 
practically abandoned the colporteur method and 
were pursuing their work in other and more ef- 
fective ways. 

Shortly after the incident referred to, I was asked 
to make a home missionary address in connection 
with a meeting of the General Assembly at Sara- 
toga; and I told the pathetic (for it was pathetic) 



PEN PORTRAITS 9 

story of the colporteur and his beast. It gave me 
an opportunity of freeing my mind with reference 
to current methods of home missionary work, and 
of expressing the sentiment of western pastors 
generally as to what seemed a better way. Why 
should not our Sunday-school Board put mission- 
aries into the field under instructions to plant 
Sunday schools in destitute regions everywhere 
and let them develop naturally into churches? 
Many doubtless would die; but the fittest would 
survive and demonstrate their power of self-support. 
This suggestion had been made, over and over 
again, in our western presbyteries, but nothing had 
thus far come of it. 

A few months later I received a letter from 
James A. Worden, D.D., LL.D., superintendent 
of Sabbath-School and Missionary Work, saying 
that the Board of Publication and Sabbath School 
Work was ready to act, and asking me to name 
the best possible man, in my judgment, for the 
position of synodical superintendent for Minnesota, 
to supervise the planting of schools. Of course 
I named Robert F. Sulzer, of Albert Lea, Min- 
nesota. I did this by telegraph, saying, "He 
knows more about planting Sunday schools than 
any other man in America." My old friend Dr. 
Worden said that if Mr. Sulzer was the sort of 
man I said, he was just the man needed. 

Presently Mr. Sulzer was offered the appoint- 
ment of Synodical Superintendent of Sunday School 
Work — and declined it. I wrote him and he per- 
sisted in saying no. He came up from Albert Lea 



IO PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

to Minneapolis for a conference and was hard to 
persuade. The Board then offered him a larger sal- 
ary ; which he declined, preferring at length to ac- 
cept the original proposition. He at once entered 
on his office without fuss or feathers. His under- 
standing was that he was to plant Sunday schools, 
here, there and everywhere, in every destitute place. 
To do this he would require a considerable force 
of summer helpers, whom he proposed to get from 
among the students of various theological sem- 
inaries. The first summer showed a net result of 
about two hundred schools ; a majority of which 
were, of course, frozen out in the ensuing winter. 
But the fittest survived ; and among these were a 
few that developed a desire for preaching services. 
A score or more were provided accordingly, and 
most of these ultimately grew to be self-sustaining 
churches. 

In his book Mr. Sulzer presents the method and 
outcome of his work. Not having seen any ad- 
vance pages of the volume, I am naturally curi- 
ous to see what he will make of it. I have no mis- 
givings as to its readableness and profitableness ; 
for whatever of euphuistic rhetoric it may lack, it 
is sure to be pervaded by sound common sense. 
And it will exalt the Master. He would not permit 
me to say these things about him if he knew it: for 
there is no more modest or self-sacrificing man than 
he. May his years be multiplied and his future 
work be greatly prospered, to the glory of our com- 
mon Lord, who in all our service is first, last, midst 
and all in all. 



I. Rev. Robert N. 
Adams, D.D. 



Rev. Alfred W. Wright 




II. 

A FELLOW WORKER'S TESTIMONY 

By R. N. Adams, D.D. 

Field Secretary Emeritus of Home Missions, Northwest- 
ern District 

From personal knowledge of the field work 
under the Sabbath-School Department of the Pub- 
lication Board during the last quarter century by 
the author of this book I can unhesitatingly say 
to those who read it that the half is not told. This 
quarter century began with what is known as "The 
New Departure" in the plan of Sunday-school mis- 
sion work of the Presbyterian Church, United States 
of America, which plan I may say was initiated in 
a large measure by Rev. James A. Worden, D.D., 
LL.D., and was successfully operated under his 
splendid leadership for most of the period named. 

The first appointment made under this plan by 
Dr. Worden was Robert Frederick Sulzer, who, in 
1887, was appointed synodical superintendent for 
the Synod of Minnesota. 

Mr. Sulzer is a unique character. His remark- 
able success is due largely to the make-up of the 
man. It was not college and theological seminary 
training that brought him to the front in the Sun- 
day-school branch of church work, but it was com- 
mon sense, consecrated energy, rare German humor, 
11 



12 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

persistence, perseverance and loyalty to Cirist. His 
apt illustrations in presenting- the value of Sun- 
day-school work lose but little of their freshness 
by repetition. 

His efficiency and acceptability in public ad- 
dresses are clearly shown by the fact that in the 
last twenty-five years he has addressed the Gen- 
eral Assembly fifteen times. The secret of his 
remarkable success in this complicated work will 
not appear in the volume itself, but has been in- 
dicated to those familiar with him and his work 
by the wisdom he has ever manifested in the selec- 
tion of his subordinates, and his tact in holding 
them for so many years in the same field, as, for 
example, Thomas Scotton, of St. Cloud Presbytery, 
who has been the Sunday-school missionary there 
for over twenty years, and S. A. Blair, who has 
held a similar position in Duluth Presbytery nearly 
as long, both of whom are widely known for their 
consecration and effective work. 

I therefore predict that this little unpretentious 
volume will meet a hearty reception on the part 
of the many who are privileged to know the 
author personally and who will appreciate the op- 
portunity of getting the stimulus of a live wire. 
Indeed, I believe that this simple story of the tri- 
umphs of Sunday-school work during a quarter of 
a century in Minnesota will receive a hearty wel- 
come on the part of all those who believe that the 
saving and the training of the children of this land 
are at the foundation of civic righteousness and 
national development. 



III. 

THE MAN WHO SAVED A COLLEGE 
By Rev. A. W. Wright 

The church will never know how much it is in- 
debted to Mr. Sulzer for its development and prog- 
ress in the Northwest. A single instance, which in 
his modesty he never mentions, will verify this state- 
ment, that is the saving of Albert Lea College, not 
once or twice, but three different times. When 
nearly everyone else had abandoned the hope of 
continuing it, he came to the rescue with singular 
tact and rare ability, and at one time he caught 
the arm of the sheriff before the hammer fell. Then 
he rallied the financial forces which put the college 
on its feet. 

His little book tells a wonderful story, of the 
discovery of desert regions and of rich blessings 
which came to them after his "planting" and caus- 
ing them to "blossom as the rose." By his faithful- 
ness he has often, in feeble home mission churches, 
"strengthened the things that were ready to die." 
The book, with all its excellencies, does not tell the 
whole story, nor could anyone write it all, but those 
who know the author can read between the lines 
and gather much more from it than can others. But 
it is an inspiration to all. 

Mr. Sulzer's institute work has been an inesti- 
13 



T4 



PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 



mable benefit to large numbers of Qiristian work- 
ers. His kindness to the children and his sincere 
interest for them generally and individually has 
gained for him their confidence and entitles him 
to be called "The Giildren's Friend." His well- 
chosen words, often quietly spoken at a judicious 
moment, have caused sinners to yield promptly to 
the call of the Master and become his followers, 
and when strenuous measures were necessary to 
capture the more obstinate ones, he found such 
measures in his possession and used them effec- 
tively. It makes me think, as I recall so many of 
these incidents, of the fitness of the little verse Dr. 
S. R. Ferguson dedicated to Mr. Sulzer : 

The mountain stream with rush and roar, 
The dash of wave upon the shore, 
The cyclone with its power and might, 
The gentle morn with love and light, 
The quiet eve with peace and rest — 
All these are SULZER at his best. 

Mr. Sulzer's work, together with that of his co- 
laborers, has settled beyond controversy the ques- 
tion of the value of denominational Sunday-school 
work. It is a distinctive work and yet the greatest 
assistant to home missions we have. May he long 
be preserved to lead the hosts in this grand division 
of the Lord's army in the Northwest, and when he 
comes to cast his troubles at the Master's feet, may 
we who here witnessed his labors also witness his 
unspeakable reward when it is bestowed upon him. 



EARLY LIFE 



CHAPTER I 
EARLY LIFE 

I was born in Koenigsbach, Baden-Baden, Ger- 
many, on January 16, 1845. This was a Lutheran 
village of about a thousand people. My mother's 
home had been in Heidelberg, my father's in a 
little Catholic village near there, and when they 
were married they had come to Koenigsbach to 
make it their home. 

In these little German villages there is either a 
Catholic or a Lutheran church, but not both, and 
everyone in the village belongs to the church that 
is there. So my father had been brought up a 
Catholic, while my mother was a Lutheran. I was 
baptized in the Lutheran church of our village, but 
as I grew older I went with my father to a Catholic 
church in a neighboring village nearly every other 
Sunday. 

There were two sisters and my three brothers 
in the home, and my old grandmother lived with 
us until we came to America. She was blind, and 
so could not read the Bible she loved, and after I 
learned to read I had to read it to her and com- 
mit some to memory. I did it because I had to. 
Sometimes she would pull me out of bed half 
asleep to say my prayers. I used to lead her to 
prayer meeting, and many a time there was no- 
body there but the preacher, my grandmother and 
17 



18 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

myself. It gave me a queer impression of Chris- 
tianity. I used to think that when I grew old like 
grandmother I would be a Christian; that Chris- 
tianity was only for the old folks. 

We all had to go to church every Sunday morn- 
ing, as the custom was. The boys sat under the 
organ loft, and our school-teacher sat on a high 
chair so he could watch the boys as the guard 
watches the prisoners in the chapel during serv- 
ice. In case any of us did not sit up as straight 
as a gopher or looked over the left shoulder we 
had our names read out in school the next morn- 
ing and education put into us with a hickory cane. 

The church on the hill was a large stone build- 
ing, even the floor being of stone. There was no 
heating stove. 

Easter and Christmas were great days. The 
preachers and teachers were very dignified and 
seldom recognized the boys and girls on the street. 
In addition to the other school days, school was 
held every Saturday for half a day, when we 
studied hymns, the Bible and the Catechism. 

My brother and my uncle had come to America 
a few years before and settled at Easton, Penn- 
sylvania. They were doing well and kept writing 
us what a wonderful country this was, and urging 
my father to come over. So in March, 1858, we 
left Germany in a sailing vessel bound for America. 
The voyage lasted for thirty-nine days. 

I had learned a few words of English while I 
was on the ship. They were not good words, but 
I did not know this. I used these. We lived on 



EARLY LIFE 



19 



the East Side in New York City. My father sent 
me to the German school for some time. My 
schooling - in the English language was only about 
three or four months in all. 

One day when I was playing marbles on the 
street, one of the workers from Dr. Crosby's mis- 
sion, which was located over a liquor store, asked 
me to come to the Sunday school there. Hope 
Chapel now stands near the site of this mission. 
The first Sunday I attended, two or three people 
offered me a hymn book. I couldn't read it, for 
it was English, but the spirit of the whole meet- 
ing made a deep impression on me; they acted as 
though they loved a fellow there, and boys like 
to be loved, as well as girls. 

The next year I also attended the German Luth- 
eran Church, of which my mother was a member, 
to prepare for confirmation. When fourteen years 
old I was confirmed (though not converted) in a 
class of thirty-eight. In the afternoon of the day 
I was confirmed I went with two or three of the 
boys in the class to the home of one of the officers 
of the church who kept a store, and we all played 
cards for the cider. Later that day we went down 
to the Bowery and had another good time. Soon 
after confirmation I taught a class of boys in that 
Sunday school and sang in the boys' choir. 

At the close of the hard times, in 1858, my 
father was out of work for seven months and I 
had a chance to work in the first hoop-skirt fac- 
tory started in New York by a Mr. Wagner of 
Paris. At first I worked for fifty cents a week, 



20 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

and then my pay was raised to seventy-five cents. 
Later I worked in a confectionery store and had 
to go to Wall Street once a week with a load of 
fancy cakes to sell on the street. In i860 I worked 
at the tinner's trade in connection with a hardware 
store. 

When the Civil War broke out I enlisted in the 
Garabaldi Zouaves. When I offered myself for 
service the captain said, "You are not big- enough 
to carry a musket." I told him I was big enough 
to carry a snare drum, and the bystanders told 
the captain to "take the boy." In my estimation 
I was the richest, greatest man in New York City 
on my way to the barracks. In a day or so I 
went back home to get a change of garments and 
told mother where I was. I said: 

"Mother, I am a soldier. I am on a furlough 
of two hours, and I am going right back. I just 
came home to get some clean clothes." 

But she replied: 

"If you say anything more about being a sol- 
dier, I will spank you." 

As I had not been sworn in — I was too young — 
she was able to keep me from going to the war. 

When President Lincoln was in New York on 
his way to Washington for his inauguration I ran 
ahead of the procession and climbed a tree, where 
I waited for three hours to see him. Fortunately 
I was just in front of the Astor House, where he 
was stopping and so could see him and hear his 
address to the people. 

My father — who was a tailor — wanted me to 



EARLY LIFE 21 

work with him, but as I didn't like the trade I 
made up my mind to leave New York to make my 
way in the world. I was then seventeen years of 
age. As my mother kissed me good-by she said: 

"Now, Robert, when you get into trouble any 
time, go to Jesus ; he will help you out." 

And in the days that followed, when I was at 
the card table or in the dance hall, these words 
would come back to me and make me think. 

With eleven cents in my pocket I went to Pas- 
saic, New Jersey, where I worked for a tailor for 
a little over a day. From there I walked to Pater- 
son, New Jersey. The town clock was striking 
twelve as I entered the city, and by one o'clock I 
had found employment and was at work. My pay 
was three dollars a week; out of this I paid two 
dollars and seventy-five cents for board and lodg- 
ing, without washing. My employer promised to 
give me all the overtime I wanted at ten cents an 
hour. Some weeks I worked as much as ninety 
hours in all, and occasionally even more. Besides 
that I took care of two horses before seven in the 
morning and after six at night, for fifty cents a 
week. They had to be groomed and harnessed 
and the wagon put in front of the office before 
seven o'clock. 

I didn't write home for a long time, and my 
father and mother were very much worried over 
it. My mother went to a fortune teller to find 
out where I was, and this fortune teller told her 
T had enlisted and that I was down South with 
the army; that I had just been in quite a battle 



22 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

and that another battle was coming off in the near 
future. If I went safely through that I would re- 
turn again. The battle came off; they never heard 
from me, and my mother went temporarily insane. 
When I finally wrote to mother, father came to 
see me and brought me a suit of new clothes. This 
was the only time he was ever out of New York 
City. 



WESTWARD BOUND 






CHAPTER II 
WESTWARD BOUND 

In 1863 I started for the West and worked my 
way to Port Jervis, New York. From there I 
worked my way on the canal boat to Dunkirk. 
In Dunkirk I could not find work, so I went on 
further west to Elmira. I rode part of the way 
on the top of the cars till the brakeman drove me 
off; then I went into the immigrant car and 
stretched out on a bench. When the conductor 
passed through the car I had my big slouch hat 
over my eyes and was snoring, and consequently 
he supposed I was one of the immigrants and 
passed me by. 

Again at Elmira there was no work, so I took 
the train to the next station, where I stopped for 
half a day and helped plant tobacco. In that half 
day I had all the farming I wanted. I started on 
foot for Corning, New York, where I landed about 
dark, and at once was engaged to begin work in 
a hardware and tin store next morning at seven 
o'clock. 

One Sunday morning — after being there for 
some months — I came to four churches in a row 
and decided to go into one, which turned out to 
be the Presbyterian Church. After the benedic- 
tion I hurried out from the back seat, but the old 
janitor was too quick for me. He followed close 
3 2 5 



26 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

behind me, laid his gentle hand on my shoulder 
and urged me to stay to Sunday school. I stayed 
just to please him. The teacher was Rev. Wm. A. 
Niles, D.D. At the close of the lesson he asked 
me to come again. 

The next day Dr. Niles called on me in the old 
dirty tin shop. This was the first ministerial call 
I ever had — and I was much pleased over it. The 
following winter an evangelist from Rochester 
held a series of meetings in Dr. Niles's church, and 
at this happy time I found Christ as my personal 
Saviour, uniting with the church on confession of 
faith. 

Dr. Niles was a great missionary preacher, had 
missionary meetings once a month and always had 
some one present to speak, or a letter from the field. 
I became interested, and wanted to be a foreign 
missionary, but I didn't think I was qualified for 
it, and was somewhat ashamed to speak of it to 
anyone. But a chance to do home mission work 
was given me. The day after I united with the 
church one of the elders asked me to go with him 
across the river to help in his mission school. I 
told him I would come and fill up a seat; that was 
the best I could do. That was the means of set- 
ting me at work. 

Mr. Parker, the evangelist, gave me lessons in 
English at thirty cents an hour, and I took as 
many lessons as my money would hold out for. 

Dr. Niles found much against tobacco in his 
Bible lessons and was opposed to the use of it. 
I thought so much of him that I was ashamed to 



WESTWARD BOUND 27 

have him see me smoking. Whenever I met him 
I would throw my cigar into the gutter. 

I had been boarding at the hotel, where there was 
a bar, but when I joined the church I went to 
board in a private home. At my new boarding 
place I had to room with three young men, none 
of them Christians. When I would kneel down on 
retiring they would as likely as not throw a boot 
or a pillow at me. I could not get peace. I had 
given up cards, but I tried to think dancing was 
all right. I wrestled for three months after I 
joined the church, and finally one night I decided 
that dancing was wrong and I would give it up, 
so I said to the Lord, "Here goes all," and the 
peace and blessing came. 

Soon one of my roommates left town and a big, 
stalwart man was put in his place, who was a thor- 
ough Christian. When Sunday morning came he 
said, "Boys, we will all read and have worship," 
and there was not one of them dared to say no. 
It was a great relief to me and a help in my Chris- 
tian life, and the question has been in my mind 
sometimes whether this relief would have come if 
I had not given up all. 

On New Year's Eve of 1863, a friend invited me 
to take a drink with him and I refused, told him 
I had had two drinks already and that was enough. 
He insisted, and finally I told him that if I took 
another drink I would not touch it for three 
months. 

About six weeks after that there was a lecture 
at Painted Post, three miles away, to which I in- 



28 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

vitecl two young ladies. We went out in a sleigh 
and stopped at the hotel before the lecture. While 
one of the ladies was playing the piano I got three 
glasses of wine from the bar for them and myself. 
The one to whom I was paying some attention 
turned to me and said, "You know what you 
promised." I said: "Never mind. It is cold and 
we have to take a little for the stomach's sake!" 
I swallowed the wine, but I said right there: "I 
will never take another drink. If I can't stop for 
three months it is time I quit." And that was the 
end of my indulgence in drink. 

The following June I felt that I ought to go 
home and stay with mother. I reached home just 
too late for the funeral of my younger brother, 
who had been drowned the very day and hour I 
felt the impression that I ought to go home. He 
was a good Christian boy, about eleven years old. 

I reached New York with the determination to 
live with father and mother and be a good boy. I 
united with the Young Men's Christian Association 
and with the Seventh Presbyterian Church and 
taught a class of boys in the Rivington Street Mis- 
sion of that church. This mission school was held 
in the public-school building where I had attended 
school, and my class was seated at almost the same 
place where I used to sit. 

I took special pains with my boys because I 
had been a boy and knew the temptations they 
had and how to sympathize with them. On Sun- 
days the whole school marched to the church, 
every teacher with his class. The mission school 



WESTWARD BOUND 29 

sat on one side of the gallery and the mother 
school on the other side during the morning 
preaching service, each teacher sitting with his 
class. 

In the fall of 1864 I felt greatly worried for fear 
the old temptations would be too strong for me, 
so I laid the matter before the Lord and he opened 
the way for me to leave New York. I heard of 
a position at Towanda, Pennsylvania, made appli- 
cation for it, and secured it. 

I took my letter to the Presbyterian church 
there in the fall of 1865. A few members, of whom 
I was one, proposed that we get Rev. E. P. Ham- 
mond to come to the town and hold evangelistic 
meetings. He came, and there were over two 
hundred conversions. I was then engaged to 
marry Cornelia C. Brown, of Towanda, who was 
not a Christian. I had decided that we would not 
be married until she was. These meetings led to 
her conversion. On January 24, 1866, we were 
married. 

After the meetings some of us young people 
went out to various schoolhouses in the neigh- 
borhood and held evangelistic meetings. For 
four weeks I went eight miles, with a number of 
these young people assisting, and we had twenty- 
five conversions. I afterwards organized a Sun- 
day school in the neighborhood and superintended 
it as long as I stayed in Towanda. 

After some years in business at Wyalusing, 
Pennsylvania, I went west to Chicago. In a few 
days I got work with the Illinois Central Railroad. 



3 o PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

In the seven months I spent there I taught a Sun- 
day-school class in one of the missions on State 
Street, near Forty-first Street, and worked with 
Mr. Moody in the old Young Men's Christian As- 
sociation building. 



MISSIONARY RAILROADING 



CHAPTER III 
MISSIONARY RAILROADING 

In the fall of 1882 the Illinois Central Railroad 
was building new shops at Waterloo, Iowa, to take 
the place of the old shops at Dubuque, and I was 
sent to assist the architect in completing the work. 
After being in Waterloo for some weeks I asked 
the master mechanic if I might remain there in- 
stead of returning to Chicago. He said he would 
be glad to have me stay, and so about Christmas 
time Mrs. Sulzer and the two children, Clara and 
Mamie, joined me at Waterloo. 

In January, 1883, I was elected superintendent 
of the Sunday school of the Waterloo Presbyterian 
church. Notwithstanding the growth of the school 
from forty-five to one hundred and twenty-five 
pupils in ten months, I was asked to resign in 
favor of another brother. One of the elders was 
elected the day I resigned, but he was asked to 
resign the next Sunday. When the pupils and 
teachers found out that I had been asked to re- 
sign they wanted to reelect me, but I refused and 
told them I would stay with them. The same year 
I was elected an elder, but declined ; the next year 
I was reelected and ordained. 

While I was superintendent the question of 
starting a railroad mission was considered. The 
workers wanted me to take the lead, but I abso- 
33 



34 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

lutely refused. Then I was stricken blind, and I 
promised the Lord to go on with it. When my 
sight was restored, I refused once more, thinking 
I was not the man for it. Then I was taken with 
a fever, and again I promised the Lord I would 
do the work, but when I got better I told him I 
couldn't. Then I had a relapse, and I promised 
the Lord that if he would spare my life and raise 
me up again I would certainly do the work. 

I tried to keep my promise when I got well, but 
it seemed as if every way was blocked. There 
was no place to hold the session. 

After six months a saloon-keeper moved from 
his old quarters, and we were told we could have 
the place, renting it from month to month, until 
a new saloon could be located there. But I had 
no money to fit it up. One night, at midnight, I 
was wrestling with the Lord, when the brightest 
vision I ever saw came and I heard a voice tell- 
ing me that the first man who came to me the 
next morning after I went to the shop was the 
one I should ask to raise the money. 

The next morning the first man who came was 
Bill McMillan, a drinking Scotchman, and the last 
man I had expected the Lord to send to help me. 
As I looked at him, trying to make myself believe 
he was the man, I said to him, "Bill, you know 
I have been talking about a railroad mission here." 
"Yes, Bob," said he. "Well," said I, "do you sup- 
pose we could raise enough money to start it up 
there in that saloon building?" And he said, 
"Sure." I gave him the subscription paper and 



MISSIONARY RAILROADING 35 

told him what to try to get. By eleven o'clock that 
morning he had more than I had asked him to 
get. 

The school was organized with thirty-two mem- 
bers. I was superintendent, assistant superintend- 
ent, secretary, treasurer, librarian and also janitor 
for some time. We used a large beer box for the 
library books. The Christians had no faith that 
the mission would amount to anything. I started 
with nine unconverted teachers, but before the end 
of the first year the Lord gave us some conver- 
sions, so I could fill out all the offices. In two 
years we had two hundred pupils. 

After we had been in the old saloon building 
nearly two years I wanted to get a new chapel. 
One Sunday I asked the teachers to remain, and 
I told them that the old building would have to 
be repaired for the winter. The teachers thought 
it would be cheaper to build a new chapel. We 
were not in the new chapel over a month before 
the old building was again rented for a saloon. 

The railroad company gave the ground on which 
to build the chapel. I circulated a subscription 
paper among the railroad men, one being circulated 
among the business men, and in three months' 
time we had over a thousand dollars. We had no 
trouble raising the rest of the fifteen hundred dol- 
lars required. The chapel was dedicated January 
1, 1876. With the assistance of C. S. Billings, a 
Sunday-school missionary, and the pastors of the 
town we conducted a series of meetings and had 
nearly a hundred conversions. By this time I had 



36 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

a very faithful company of teachers and workers 
and a large body of interested young people. 

I am glad to say that I never had a difficulty 
with one of the children. The nearest I came to 
it was one Sunday when one boy's elbow got into 
another boy's ribs, and the other boy's elbow flew 
down into his ribs, so that they had quite a little 
exercise before the school began. One of the 
teachers came to me and said, "Sulzer, if you don't 
put that boy out I am going." Said I, "Brother, 
I guess you will have to go, we will keep the 
boy." Neither he nor the boy went. 

That week I looked up the family to which the 
boy belonged. I found a family of five children, 
the father a drinking man and the mother going 
out every day to wash and scrub, so the children 
had to bring themselves up. In a few months I 
had a Sunday-school concert, and this awful boy 
was the leading star. The last account I had of 
him was that he was an upright and prominent 
business man in an eastern city. 

While I was superintending the mission I was 
invited to speak at various kinds of meetings. 
Once I was asked to give an address at a Sunday- 
school convention, urging upon the various schools 
the importance of keeping open all winter. A big 
Scotchman got up and called me down, saying: 
"What does Mr. Sulzer know about country 
schools; he lives in the city? It would be just 
impossible to maintain the country Sunday school 
during the winter." 

Then another man got up, and he, too, went for 




The Sulzer heme on the North Dakota p 



pl" ' ''- 7 -: 



Mrs. Sulzer and her Sunday-school class from neighboring 
homesteads. 



% y • ■ « # 




Mr. J. B. Clapp, Mr. R. F. Sulzer, Rev. A. W. Wright, 

Mrs. R. F. Sulzer, Rev. John R. Hughes, at Oliver, 

North Dakota. 



MISSIONARY RAILROADING 



37 



me, but I wouldn't give in an inch on my argu- 
ment. 

Two years after that I was invited to a similar 
meeting in the same locality, when this big Scotch- 
man rose up and said: "I am glad Brother 
Sulzer is with us to-day. Some of you know what 
I said to him two years ago. I want to say that 
when fall came — the usual time to close up — the 
whole school voted to go on during the winter. 
I was the only one that was opposed to the plan, 
and I had to fall in. We had eleven conversions 
that winter." 

The other brother made a similar statement, 
said that in his school they had had thirteen con- 
versions, and had found out that they could main- 
tain the school in winter. 

While I was railroading I was interested in all 
kinds of mission work and often spoke to the rail- 
road men about their salvation. One evening I 
said to one of them, "George, are you ready to 
become a Christian?" "No use trying, Robert. 
A man can't live a Christian and railroad." "Well," 
said I, "you come in here." This was after ten 
o'clock at night. I took him into the mission, the 
old saloon building, and in the dark I said, 
"George, if you ever expect to eat another meal 
you give your heart to the Lord right now, or you 
never will." He was converted, raised a Christian 
family, and is now a prominent official of a trunk 
railroad line in the South, and is letting his light 
shine along the lines of his road. 

At one time one of the churches was holding: 



3 8 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

protracted meetings, and Billy, one of the railroad 
men, attended, became interested and went for- 
ward to the altar every night for a week or more. 
I met him during the day and saw there was no 
change, so one night after he had been forward 
I went for him outside after the meeting. Said I, 
"What are you going up to the altar for?" "I 
want to be a Christian." "Why aren't you one?" 
"Don't know." I said, "Come on with me." I 
took him up to the old saloon building, too, and 
locked the door. Said I: "This is the time for 
you to give your heart to the Lord. We'll settle 
it right here before you leave. Get down on your 
knees." He got down on his knees and I said, 
"Pray." He said he couldn't. I said, "You will 
have to if you are going to be a Christian." He 
repeated after me as I prayed. He also was con- 
verted and was leading a faithful Christian life 
when I last heard of him in Texas. 



OBEYING THE CALL TO SERVICE 



CHAPTER IV 
OBEYING THE CALL TO SERVICE 

About five years after I started this railroad mis- 
sion I was asked to go out to visit and encourage 
a neighboring school. One of the missionaries of 
the American Sunday School Union had made this 
appointment for me at a schoolhouse about four 
miles out, and he had invited the secretary from 
Philadelphia and also the district superintendent, 
F. C. Ensign, of Chicago, to be there, but I did 
net know why they were there. 

After the meeting Mr. Ensign asked me if I 
was willing to take up the Sunday-school work. 
I told him I didn't know; that I had never thought 
about it, and didn't think I was fit for it. Then 
I asked, "When do you want me?" "To-morrow," 
was the answer. "Well, you can't have me to- 
morrow," I said. "I will have to see Mrs. Sulzer 
first and pray over it." When I asked Mrs. Sulzer, 
her reply was, "You might as well go into it; you 
are two thirds in now." 

After a few months of careful consideration I 
decided to take up the work and asked the master 
mechanic for my time. He said he would rather 
give me a lay-off for three months; I might not 
like the new work and he would hold my job for 
me. He did keep the place open for me for six 
months. Then, notwithstanding the fact that I 
4 41 



42 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

was getting four hundred dollars less salary than 
when railroading, I told him I felt that I was 
elected for the Sunday-school missionary work and 
would continue in it. In less than a year the 
superintendent offered me a good position on the 
New Orleans division of the road if I would come 
back, but I declined. 

* * * 

One of my first trips in my new work was to 
assist at a Sunday-school convention. Then I took 
trips to spy out the land and find out where schools 
were needed. 

On one of these trips I went to see a good Bap- 
tist deacon, who lived about seventeen miles south 
of Waterloo. When I got to the house he urged 
me to drive in, because he had a job for me that 
night. 

As we were putting up the horses for the night 
I asked him whether the job was to clean out the 
barn. He said it was a worse job than that. The 
young people of the community had driven the 
Christian people out of the church, keeping them 
from holding prayer meeting there, and for that 
evening he had appointed a meeting in a private 
house. The young people had boasted that they 
would drive them out of that and he wanted me to 
help him. 

After supper the deacon hitched up, took his 
family and me and drove some miles to the house 
where the meeting was to be held. As we entered 
I saw that in every room were two or three young 
couples, giggling and getting ready for the picnic 



OBEYING THE CALL TO SERVICE 43 

they expected to have. I had told the deacon on 
the way that when the time came to open the meet- 
ing he was not to give me any taffy, but simply 
rise up and say that Mr. Sulzer had charge of the 
meeting. I assured him I would do the rest. 

When he made the announcement, I got up and 
shouted repeatedly, "Glory hallelujah!" clapping 
my hands and rubbing them together, and kept on 
till I had all the people in one room; they came 
to see what was going on. I told them we were 
going to have a glorious meeting, and I wanted 
them to be there to enjoy it. When they were 
all in I announced the hymn and opened the meet- 
ing. We had one of the best meetings I ever at- 
tended. The order was perfect, for the young 
people were taken by surprise by my procedure. 

In about a month I went back there and arranged 
for an institute in the church. Again it was their 
prayer-meeting evening. They had gained cour- 
age and had gone back to the church. They asked 
me to lead the meeting. The church was two 
thirds filled with young people. During the open- 
ing prayer there was an awful racket. I opened 
my eyes and saw that the young people were hav- 
ing a good time. I took a text and tried to give 
them a good gospel talk, but while I was talking 
they continued to disturb the meeting. 

When I was through my talk, I said: "Brethren, 
I believe the Bible, don't you? Well, you know 
that the Bible says, 'Watch and Pray/ Now, 
brethren, I want you to do the praying and I will 
do the watching." I sat up straight, and looked 



44 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

the young people square in the eyes. The deacons 
were very earnest in their prayers, and I watched 
the young people. There was perfect order; not 
a move. 

In closing the meeting I announced that two 
weeks from the next Sunday I expected to have 
services in the church from nine in the morning 
till nine at night, with a basket dinner, and the 
notice I wanted to leave was that the one who did 
not behave himself that day would eat dinner with 
the sheriff Monday noon. Then I dismissed them. 
I need not say that I had a good house when the 
time for the all-day meeting came, for people were 
there from nearly twenty miles around to see who 
would eat dinner with the sheriff Monday noon. 
Instead of any disturbance we had a number of 
conversions and the best of order, and we taught 
the young people a lesson on behavior at church 
services. 

* * * 

When I began work as a missionary I bought a 
second-hand buggy and harness, for which I paid 
twelve dollars. After using it a year or two, I 
was driving one Sunday with a man whom I in- 
tended to put in for superintendent of the school 
to be organized that day. All at once the "one- 
hoss shay" went all to pieces. I laid some of the 
pieces across the axle, and rode on these. My 
companion walked. We made our appointment, 
and then managed to arrive home the following 
day. This was the last trip that buggy made. 

The horse I had bought for half price because 




Reaching for the Sabbath-schc 
Lesson Picture Card. 



'he salvation of the children the 
hope of the country. 




sionary Wagoi 



OBEYING THE CALL TO SERVICE 45 

he was a kicker and everybody was afraid of him. 
I was two hours hitching him up the first time, 
and there were two of us working at the job. But 
in two years' time the missionary horse was tame 
enough to stand anything and to stand anywhere. 
Some weeks afterwards some friends raised the 
money and bought a good top-buggy. They ar- 
ranged for a jollification meeting in the chapel and 
set the buggy up on the sidewalk. After a young 
lady had recited "The One-Hoss Shay" they pre- 
sented me with my new "one-hoss shay," saying 
that the "Dr. Holmes's Shay" spoken of had never 
carried so many children to Sunday school as the 
one I had owned, and they hoped this new outfit 
would be just as roomy. 

A series of meetings that I conducted in con- 
nection with the Railroad Mission at Dubuque, 
Iowa, was very successful and resulted in the or- 
ganization of the Third Presbyterian Church. Dur- 
ing these meetings I decided that there ought to 
be a Sunday school in the vicinity. Many thought 
that nothing could be done, but I went to the man 
who owned a vacant hotel on the hill and asked 
him what he would charge for half of it for Sun- 
day to start a Sunday school. He said there was 
no use trying to start a school there, but I asked 
him to come up the next Sunday and see. 

On Saturday, when I went up on the hill to do 
some visiting, the children of nearly the whole 
community were coasting down the hill, which was 
about a mile long. I coasted with them, and then 



4 6 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

after I had them all interested I invited them out 

to the meeting at three o'clock the next day. When 

the time came seventy-six were present. The 

owner of the building- was there, and when he saw 

the fine turnout he was delighted. This school 

proved a grand success and afterwards developed 

into a church. 

* * * 

After I had worked six months in northern Iowa, 
southern Minnesota was added to my field and I 
was asked to establish my headquarters at Albert 
Lea, Minnesota. The Waterloo people wanted to 
circulate a petition asking the Union not to re- 
move me from that field, and offered to pay me 
to go on with the work of the mission there. My 
former railroad work with the salary of one thou- 
sand dollars was also open to me. But I felt that 
the call to the Sunday-school missionary work was 
of the Lord, and I must continue with the Sunday 
School Union. Though my salary of six hundred 
dollars was small for a family of seven to live on 
I knew that, with the Lord's blessing, it would be 
enough. 

Of course we had some hard times, and some- 
times it seemed as if I ought to give up the work. 
At one particularly hard time a man offered me 
a position at ninety dollars a month, which would 
have allowed me to be at home with my family 
every day, but I was doing the Lord's work and 
I could not leave it for a larger salary. 

Sometimes the Lord raised up friends in the 
most unexpected places. In order to get groceries 



OBEYING THE CALL TO SERVICE 47 

at one time I had been obliged to sell my horse 
and go afoot. Some weeks after a good brother 
in Chicago, whom I did not know, heard of my 
trouble and sent me as a loan one hundred dollars 
with which to buy a horse. I bought a mare and 
after three years I returned the money by selling 
her colt for a hundred dollars. 

After one very hard trip I came home with my 
mind made up to apply for work to one of the of- 
ficials of the Santa Fe Railroad, for I felt that I 
ought to be at home more than I could be while 
in the Sunday-school work. I had found Mrs. 
Sulzer very much overworked and not able to get 
hired help. When I went into the bedroom to 
get this man's address I found my oldest daugh- 
ter, Clara, lying on the bed quite sick. I sat down 
by her and held her head, and so remained. As 
a result I neglected to get the address and did not 
write for the position. During the night she grew 
worse, and in the early morning God took her 
home. 

At her birth we had consecrated her to the for- 
eign mission field because I didn't get to go my- 
self, and it was a hard struggle to give her up. 
But after some days I saw my mistake and be- 
came reconciled to the loss. Then it seemed to 
me that by her death the Lord had called me to 
keep on working for him in the home mission field, 
and I went back to my work with a stronger faith 
in my call to it. 

Mrs. Sulzer gladly carried the burdens of the 
home. My salary would not allow us to have the 



48 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

help she needed in the household work. Over- 
worked as she was, when she was attacked by 
typhoid fever in the summer of 1886, she had not 
the strength to overcome it and passed to her re- 
ward. 

This great sorrow left me with seven children 
to care for as best I could. It was a hard struggle 
to continue my work under such conditions ; 
many times it seemed that I must give it up. 
But the Lord led me to choose another com- 
panion and helper. We were married in October, 
1887. 

In 1887 I received a letter from the Board of 
Publication and Sabbath School Work of the Pres- 
byterian Church, United States of America, saying 
that I had been commissioned to take up the de- 
nominational work. My field was to be the State 
of Minnesota. My commission was the first one 
sent out by the Board after the General Assembly 
had instructed them to do this work. 

I had been with the American Sunday School 
Union nine years and four months when this call 
came. In that time I organized two hundred and 
fifty-seven Sunday schools, out of which grew six- 
teen churches of various denominations. 

The American Sunday School Union were very 
kind to me, and I enjoyed my work with them, 
but I had argued, even before I entered their 
employ, that it is essential that each denomination 
— in order to build up a strong, faithful member- 
ship — should train its own children. After twenty- 
five years' experience with the denominational 



OBEYING THE CALL TO SERVICE 



49 



work I feel more convinced than ever that my 
early impressions were correct. 

During part of this time Rev. Joseph Brown 
was doing splendid work for our church in the 
neighboring state of Wisconsin. When his health 
failed that state was added to my field for one 
year. In 1907, on the death of Rev. J. B. Clapp, 
synodical superintendent of North Dakota, that 
state was added to mine, Minnesota and North 
Dakota have been my special fields since that time. 

After the General Assembly had decided to in- 
augurate denominational Sunday-school work, and 
I had agreed to take up the work for the Board, 
Rev. James A. Worden, D.D., who was then super- 
intendent of the department, wrote me asking what 
work needed to be done and the best way for the 
church to do it. I wrote him, substantially out- 
lining the system by which we have, to a great 
extent, carried on our Sunday-school work ever 
since. 

One of the suggestions that I made was that it 
might be a good idea to hold a Sunday-school in- 
stitute in connection with presbytery; but it was 
thought best not to have such an institute at that 
time. Later I suggested to synod's committee that 
they recommend to synod the holding of such an 
institute. The proposition was indorsed, and I was 
given the chance to hold one. 

Accordingly, in 1892, I called the first synodical 
Sunday-school institute ever held in the Presby- 
terian Church. It was held at St. Paul and we 
had one hundred and fifty delegates. It was a 



So 



PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 



decided success, notwithstanding the excitement 
attending the National Republican Convention in 
Minneapolis at the same time. In 1893 we had 
another institute at Minneapolis with two hundred 
delegates present. These and subsequent insti- 
tutes proved a great stimulus to our work through- 
out the synod and I have often felt that they had 
much to do with the success in developing not 
only the Sunday schools, but the churches through- 
out the state. 

Of late years our General Assembly has strongly 
recommended this institute work throughout all 
our synods, especially for educational work. But 
while these institutes are largely of an educational 
nature they also encourage and stimulate the lead- 
ers to more active work, which was the object we 
had at the outset. 

Some twenty-two years ago one of the presby- 
teries wanted to ordain me, but I objected. After 
I left the meeting they appointed a commission to 
ordain me, but I informed the- commission that I 
believed in a thoroughly educated ministry and that 
a man like myself, with limited schooling, could 
do better work in the Master's service as a layman 
and ruling elder. 



STUDENT MISSIONARIES 



CHAPTER V 
STUDENT MISSIONARIES 

Before the Board had permanent missionaries in 
Minnesota, certain students from the junior classes 
of the various seminaries were appointed to do 
Sunday-school work during the summer vacation. 
This proved a great blessing to the church. Not 
only was good accomplished during the summers, 
but the experience that these young men received 
in going from home to home and community to 
community helped them to become better pastors. 

One year we had fourteen students and we 
organized two hundred and sixty-nine Sunday 
schools during the year. Many of them traveled 
on ponies which I bought for them. 

One of the pony-riders was a student from 
Princeton. I located him in the northern part of 
the state, which had not been cleared up very much 
then. After he had been there a few weeks, he 
asked me what I meant by sending him where there 
was not a Presbyterian church within twenty miles ; 
nothing but stumps and rocks. He wanted to know 
what to do and where to go. I told him to hold 
down the stumps and rocks until I could come ; in 
the meantime he was to make a week-day appoint- 
ment in the schoolhouse. 

At that meeting we had a good audience and 
organized a little Presbyterian Sunday school. The 
53 



54 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

man who was elected superintendent was not very 
enthusiastic. He had been trained as a Method- 
ist, but he was not a Methodist in working order. 
He invited us to his house to stay all night. When 
we reached his home the student sat down and 
tried to impress upon him his duties as superin- 
tendent, and among other things wanted him to 
promise to teach the Confession of Faith and the 
Shorter Catechism, neither of which he had in 
all probability ever heard of. No wonder he 
wouldn't promise to do as he was asked. 

When we went upstairs to bed my student sat 
on the edge of the bed — there was space for only 
one chair in the room — and wept like a child. He 
said to me, "I don't see why a man trying to run 
a Sunday school won't promise to teach anything." 
While he wept I had to laugh. I told him that 
by the time he had traveled with me six months 
he would find that the woods were full of that kind 
of superintendents. 

That young man organized fourteen Sunday 
schools in his territory that summer, and three 
churches have since been organized from those 
schools! 

Three years later I was at the opening of Mac- 
alester College, Minnesota, when a young man 
came across the car and said he was glad to see 
me at the meeting that day. Then he told me 
he was from the field where the student had or- 
ganized those fourteen schools. He said there 
were three more from the locality attending col- 
lege that year! 



STUDENT MISSIONARIES 55 

One of the students had organized a Sunday- 
school in a little town and I wanted to encourage 
it, but I couldn't find anything of the school. It 
looked as though the young student had carried 
the school back with him to the seminary as a 
sample. 

When I went there and spoke to the people 
about reorganizing the school they wanted to know 
what I would make it. I told them I would make 
it Presbyterian. They said nothing could be done 
there unless we made a Union school of it. I told 
them they had had a Union school, and that it 
died quick; we would put something there with 
a backbone, so it would stand. Some people have 
more wishbone than backbone. 

I secured a hall, paid fifteen dollars for the first 
month's rent, bought four dozen chairs and half a 
cord of wood, hired a man to saw the wood, put 
up a stove, and then went visiting from house to 
house, inviting the neighbors to the meeting. I 
found large families, and all promised to come. 
When Sunday morning came I wondered if the hall 
would hold all that had promised to come. I re- 
membered that — in case I didn't have enough 
seats — I could fix up more seats from some empty 
beer cases I had seen in the yard. 

When the meeting was called to order there was 
just one man, one woman, two girls and a boy 
present. I organized a Sunday school, elected the 
man for superintendent and the woman for assist- 
ant and teacher, and fixed the time of meeting. 
Then I told them I would be back in two weeks 



56 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

and that there would be preaching morning and 
evening. When I came back I had thirteen in the 
morning and twenty-nine at night. 

I paid the rent for three months, and after that 
the people began to be interested and so able to 
pay their own bills. A young man was put in as 
home missionary, and the school soon developed 
into a church, which is now self-supporting. Two 
young men have gone out from this school and 
are preaching the gospel to-day. 
* * * 

In 1890 a student was located in Crow Wing 
County and soon he reported that he had a num- 
ber of schools organized in his district. Late in 
the fall I wrote to one of these schools that if they 
would keep the school going during the winter 
months the Board would give them the needed 
supplies so that they could use their money to 
keep warm. The superintendent wrote back that 
they had no trouble about fuel; it was the room 
to meet in that bothered them. 

Soon afterwards I received a letter from Mait- 
land Alexander, now pastor of the First Presby- 
terian Church of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, but 
then a student in Princeton Seminary, and also 
superintendent of the Sunday school. He said that 
the children of his school had brought in Christ- 
mas presents and that if I knew of some worthy 
school and could make use of them he would send 
them. I wrote to him to send on the box, and at 
the same time I wrote to this superintendent up 
in the Crow Wing district, saying that I had a 




2. Rev. Christopher Humble, M.D., who was brought into the service 

as a Sabbath-school Missionary through Mr. Sulzer. 

3. Luncheon at an open-air Sunday-school Institute, Lake Chetek, 

Minnesota. 



STUDENT MISSIONARIES 57 

box of Christmas presents for the children, and 
that if he had- a place for a meeting I would come 
and bring it. He wrote back by return mail to 
bring the box; they would find the room. He 
met me at the station with a little. Indian pony 
and cutter. Going about ten miles up the Mis- 
sissippi River on the ice, with the temperature 
about twenty-five below zero, he kept quite warm 
and comfortable by whipping and urging on the 
lazy little pony. Finally I asked him to let me 
drive for a while, but he didn't see the point — 
that I wanted to get warmed up also! 

We had a very pleasant evening. Learning 
that three residents of the neighborhood were 
not present, I told them I would postpone the 
distribution of the gifts until the next night 
and have another meeting. All the neighbors 
were there the next evening and so I distrib- 
uted the gifts. The box was a little like the 
widow's cruse of oil ; it seemed as though it never 
got empty. We had gifts enough to go three times 
around. 

After the distribution I asked where the Sun- 
day school was to meet the next Sunday. They 
told me they had no place for the school. I urged 
the importance of a Sunday school, and finally a 
good woman said we could meet at her house. 
Other offers followed, and I made provision for 
nearly three months' meetings from house to house. 
Then I proposed that the men come and chop 
down some of the pines and put up a log church. 
One man rose up and said that they didn't have 
5 



58 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

the money for doors and windows. I told them 
that the Lord helps those who help themselves; 
that if they did the rest I thought we could pro- 
vide enough for the doors and windows and 
shingles. The Board of Church Erection came to 
our rescue, and furnished enough money to buy 
the necessaries. 

I appointed one of the men to boss the job if 
1 wasn't there. They put up the church and sent 
for me when it was completed. At the first Sun- 
day service I held in the new house fourteen were 
converted. 









ORGANIZING UNDER 
DIFFICULTIES 



CHAPTER VI 
ORGANIZING UNDER DIFFICULTIES 

From the car window I saw a new town spring- 
ing up. When we stopped at the station I learned 
from the agent that there was neither Sunday 
school nor church there. So I wired to our pastor 
at the next station, asking him to meet me when 
I came through. When I saw him I told him I 
wanted him to go to this new town and make an 
appointment for me. I had appointments every 
evening that week, but by traveling at night I 
reached this town again on Saturday morning. 

That day I visited every home in the vicinity 
and made arrangements for a place over a store 
for our meeting; there was to be an entrance and 
a stairway on the outside so that we could get to 
the meeting place without passing through the 
store. We had to have our services in the wait- 
ing room of the depot the first Sunday. The agent 
was not a Christian, but he was a big-hearted man, 
as the railroad men generally are. 

A Sunday school was organized, and as there 
was no one there particularly fitted to be super- 
intendent, the people elected a young man, a for- 
eigner. Some one said he had been the prize 
fighter of the community. After some weeks the 
superintendent was married and that ended his 
term of office. I was glad of the opportunity to 
61 



62 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

make a change. We elected another superintend- 
ent, a woman who lived in town, and I felt im- 
pressed that I ought to go and call on her in the 
afternoon. After I talked to her about the re- 
sponsibility of the work and the important mis- 
sion she had undertaken, she told me I had got 
the wrong person; that she was at a dance all the 
night before, and proposed to go to another the 
following Saturday night. I delivered a private 
lecture on the subject of dancing, free of charge. 
It had the desired effect — she resigned. Then we 
elected a man who was not a Christian and rather 
profane. 

Soon afterwards an evangelist conducted some 
meetings at the school, and before she closed the 
meetings I had the pleasure of seeing superin- 
tendent number one and his wife stand up and 
ask for the prayers of God's people. Superintend- 
ent number two accepted Christ. Superintendent 
number three took a stand for Christ and was 
elected an elder in the church that we organized. 
* * * 

While driving over the prairie on one of my 
trips I came to a schoolhouse when the children 
were having recess. I learned from them that 
they had no Sunday school. I told them I would 
see them again. In a few weeks I went back and 
announced a service for ten o'clock the next Sun- 
day morning. 

We had a full house and I gave them a gospel 
talk. When we got ready to organize the Sunday 
school there was a great deal of objection; among 



ORGANIZING UNDER DIFFICULTIES 63 

other excuses they said they had no one for super- 
intendent. The man I wanted for superintendent 
was right in the company. I worked and talked, 
trying to have them name some one for super- 
intendent, but they wouldn't nominate anyone. It 
was nearly one o'clock. Some of them began to 
get ready to go home, when I stepped to the door, 
locked it and said that not one of them would get 
out of that door until they organized. It wasn't 
long before they nominated the person I wanted 
and he was elected superintendent. 

The school did most excellent work. One of 
the little girls that I first spoke to afterwards grad- 
uated from college and now she and her husband 
are doing faithful missionary work in Kansas. 
* * * 

While riding in a caboose on one of my trips 
a tall, old man, rather seedy-looking, entered. He 
had been away from home. His shoes were ragged 
and his face and hair looked as though he had not 
seen a barber shop for a month or two. He came 
in with a fiddle case in one hand and his wardrobe 
tied up in a red bandanna in the other. As he sat 
opposite to me my heart went out to him. I won- 
dered if he knew that the Lord loved him and I 
became very anxious to speak to him about it, but, 
as he was a large man, if he did not take it kindly 
I didn't know how I would come out, not being 
able to run away. 

After a while I asked him what he had in his 
box. When he said it was a fiddle, I asked him 
to get it out and play a tune. To my surprise he 



64 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

played all gospel hymns, so I said, "You must play 
in church." He shook his head. "You certainly 
must play in Sunday school," I suggested. Again 
he shook his head. He told me they had no use 
for tunes of that sort where he played. Then he 
told me where he lived and said they had no Sun- 
day school or church there. I told him that if he 
would promise, when he got home, to go around 
and give out an appointment for a certain Sunday, 
I would come and hold a meeting. 

On the Saturday before the meeting he met me 
at the station, twelve miles from the schoolhouse. 
When we reached the schoolhouse we found it had 
lots of grain stored in it and that it had not been 
used, even for day school, for a long time. We 
cleaned it out and got it ready for Sunday morn- 
ing, when we had a full house and organized a 
Sunday school. It flourished and in a year or two 
a church developed out of it. 

One day when I was at his home, a couple of 
years later, I asked him to give me a tune. He 
said he couldn't; he had sold his fiddle because 
they came after him to play for dances. The fam- 
ily moved later from the place, and I have heard 
that both he and his daughter are to-day playing 
violins in Sunday school. 

* * * 

I wanted to encourage the schools in a certain 
neighborhood to become "Evergreen," so I ar- 
ranged for a little Sunday-school convention in a 
grove on Elm Creek. I didn't call it a convention; 
just called it a Sunday-school picnic for all that 




a. ' rjKaw: 






ORGANIZING UNDER DIFFICULTIES 65 

part of the county. By ten o'clock some half-a- 
dozen schools had gathered. Load after load came 
In on hayracks, their baskets well filled with cake 
and pie and other good things to eat. About 
eleven o'clock a shower came up, so I moved to 
adjourn to the new barn which had been built 
there. We stationed some strong men on the 
upper floor and then pulled up the boys and girls 
and women and gave them reserved seats on the 
new hay. We borrowed an organ from one of the 
neighbors and had one of the best meetings I think 
I ever attended. There was no running out, for 
no one could get down until they were helped. 
We had dinner up there, too, and adjourned about 
five o'clock. 

As the people on one of the loads were starting 
home I told them I had heard nothing from their 
Sunday school. They said they had no Sunday 
school in their neighborhood. Then I got up on 
the hayrack — there were eighteen on the load, men, 
women and children — and I wanted to know why 
they didn't have a school and if they couldn't 
have one. I tried to show them that they could 
have one. By and by the man who drove the mule 
team said: "Look here, mister, you get off! We 
have six or seven miles to drive, lots of chores to 
do, and it is getting late." I answered, "I will 
never get off until you organize a Sunday school, 
and the quicker you organize the quicker I will 
get off." Right then I elected all of the officers, 
fixed the time for the meeting the next Sunday, 
and the only thing I forgot was to take up the col- 



66 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

lection. And off they went. I shall never forget, 
as I watched the load, which was jolting- up and 
down, how anxious I was as to whether they were 
going to lose the Sunday school out before they 
got home. 

The man who was elected superintendent had 
been a school-teacher, but had gone on a farm for 
his health. Some months afterwards I wrote him, 
asking how the school was progressing. He did 
not answer. Then after a while I wrote again, but 
there was no answer. So in the fall I went out to 
see about it. I wondered that the superintendent 
had not written, for I found him all right and the 
school growing. It was snowing the day I visited 
them, but they had a good school and at the even- 
ing service there were three conversions. The as- 
sistant superintendent stood up with a baby in 
his arms and said he wanted to be a Christian and 
wanted us to pray for him. After the meeting he 
invited me to go home with him to show him how 
to establish a family altar, said he wanted to start 
in right. The school was afterwards moved to 
town and a church organized. 
* * * 

In a town where I proposed to start a Sunday 
school I was looking up the best man for super- 
intendent. This best man had been a member of an 
evangelical church at one time, but had ceased to 
work at the business. He tried to persuade me 
that nothing could be done; nobody would come 
to a meeting. I told him I would see him later. 

I went out visiting from home to home and 



ORGANIZING UNDER DIFFICULTIES 67 

around in the country. Five miles from this place 
I called on a family, and when I told the woman 
I was a Sunday-school missionary and was trying 
to establish a Sunday school she broke down and 
wept. She explained that she had not seen a min- 
ister for fifteen years, and that her thirteen-year- 
old Johnny had never seen the inside of a Sunday 
school. On Saturday evening I went back to town, 
and the good brother again tried to convince me 
that nobody would be out at the meeting. I told 
him we would see in the morning. 

At the appointed time he and his daughter were 
there and twelve or fifteen children, but that was 
all. I thought I heard him chuckle. As I started 
to go away I said, "You take care of the children 
till I come back." I went up the street and rapped 
at the door of the saloon. When I opened the door 
there was a great audience there. I told them I 
had no bell on my meetinghouse, and as they had 
not been used to going to services here I was 
afraid they might forget about the appointed time, 
so I had come down to ask them to go to the 
schoolhouse. They promised to come, and the 
proprietor and all kept their promise. Then I 
went to the store. The storekeeper and his cus- 
tomers came also, so we had a very good audi- 
ence. The Sunday school was organized and did 
good work. 

Some years afterwards I was called to this same 
place to assist in raising money for a church build- 
ing. One of the men, who lived five miles out in 
the country, said, "Mr. Sulzer, I ain't got a dol- 



68 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

lar, but you can come down to my barn and pick 
out five of the best milch cows there, and if five 
won't bring a hundred dollars you can take six." 
The next man said, "I will go out on the prairie 
and pick up the stone for the foundation." And 
in this way we raised the money. The church was 
built, and also a manse. 

When the church was organized the man who 
gave the cows became one of the elders, and he 
was a very faithful one. He has gone to his re- 
ward, but his son, who was then a little lad, is fill- 
ing his father's place as elder and worker in the 
church. 



While conducting services in a city in Iowa I 
heard of a small town where they had no Sunday 
school or preaching services, so the day after I 
closed the meetings I took the train to this place. 

I reached the town at daybreak, and as I went 
up the street I saw people peeping out of the win- 
dows from behind the curtains ; evidently they were 
wondering what stranger was wandering around. I 
visited every house in town and invited them out 
to a meeting that night, and then visited for three 
or four miles out from the town, and all I saw 
promised to be present. 

When I reached the town again, just at meeting 
time in the evening, the schoolhouse was locked 
and I had to find the school-teacher in order to 
get the key. Then I found her kindling wood and 
built a fire, but when I attempted to light the lamps 



ORGANIZING UNDER DIFFICULTIES 69 

I found there were none to light. I went to a 
neighbor's and borrowed a lamp and I set it on the 
desk. By this time it was nearly nine o'clock. I 
looked up the street and down the street, but saw 
no one coming. 

I waited awhile, then took the front seat. And 
I kept on sitting there. Then I had a song serv- 
ice all to myself, and then I sat there some more. 
Then I had a prayer meeting. And still I sat there. 
By and by one of my German friends opened the 
door and I invited him in to help me sit there. 
After a while the door opened and eight or ten 
young people came — I suppose simply to see me 
sit there. When they sat down near the door I 
took the lamp and put it near them. 

I didn't have enough light to' read the Scrip- 
tures by, but I quoted some the best I knew how 
and sang hymns that I knew, and by the time I 
had given a gospel talk I had a fair audience, as 
the people gradually came in. I talked Sunday 
school and took a vote, then I made a motion and 
seconded it, put the question and I voted for it. 
Next I called for nomination for superintendent. 
No one said a word, so I nominated a certain man. 
I seconded the motion and then I elected him my- 
self. I filled the rest of the offices in the same way. 
After I had elected the officers I asked the people 
to suggest a time for meeting the next Sunday. 
Again there was silence, so I moved that we meet 
at three o'clock. Then I seconded the motion, and 
voted "Aye." 

It was about eleven o'clock when we got through 



;o PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

with the meeting. No one asked me to go home 
with him, so I was left alone. 

There was a night express at twelve o'clock, but 
it was not allowed to stop there, so I borrowed a 
lantern of the saloon-keeper — the saloon was the 
only place that was open — and signaled the train 
to stop. When the engineer drew up to the plat- 
form he saw what the light was for and opened 
the throttle, but I jumped on. 

The next day I went to the pastor of our near- 
est church and told him that I had found the best 
preaching place this side of China, and when I 
told him where it was he promised to go there and 
preach during the week. Six months afterwards 
I had a letter from one of the business men — the 
one I had elected as secretary of the school — thank- 
ing me very cordially for coming and starting the 
school. They had just bought a lot and hoped 
soon to build a church. 



PIONEER HOSPITALITY 



CHAPTER VII 
PIONEER HOSPITALITY 

After organizing a Sunday school in one of the 
rural districts, where the material for superintend- 
ent was very limited, the young woman who was 
elected invited me to go to her home for dinner. 
She was a very nice young woman, although in- 
experienced in Sunday-school work. I hadn't time 
to stop for dinner, but, as they lived along the 
road I had to take to my next appointment, I 
was willing to stop for bread and milk, as it 
would give me a chance to coach her as to her 
duties. 

While I was talking to her mother and father, 
who were quite elderly people, she was out in the 
kitchen getting ready my lunch. She brought it 
in — a two-quart tin basin of milk with some bread 
and a piece of pie. I was very busy talking, 
breaking in considerable bread and eating it. After 
a while, when the milk got down in the pan, my 
spoon would catch on something, capsizing it, but 
I was busy talking and didn't think about it. When 
I got down to the bottom there were black rags 
pulled through holes in the bottom of the basin, 
and the old rags were floundering around as 
though they were little bullheads. After my din- 
ner I went on my way rejoicing to my next ap- 
pointment. 

6 73 



74 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

One very busy week I organized four Sunday 
schools. I started out early Saturday morning to 
revive another that had only about twelve in at- 
tendance when they ought to have had seventy- 
five. There was so much faultfinding with the 
superintendent and others that I had to preach a 
sermon in nearly every home where I went. About 
one o'clock I came to the home of the superin- 
tendent and drove into his barnyard just as he 
was starting for the field with a scythe on his 
shoulder. Calling him by name, I asked for din- 
ner for myself and the horse. When he refused, 
I said that a little bread and milk would do me 
and a little oats for my horse. He said they had 
no time to bother with me. Then he began to tell 
about his good deeds. I just let him talk for 
nearly an hour; I made up my mind that if I 
couldn't get the bread and milk I would get the 
time. He was in such a hurry, but I wasn't. 

I thought I would stop at the next house and 
rest up, for I was just about sick and I didn't feel 
that I could drive much further. The house I 
came to was near the schoolhouse, where the 
services were to be held next day. I rapped at 
the door, and when the lady of the house came I 
called her by name and asked her if I could stay 
till morning. She said she was sorry there were 
no accommodations for me. I told her I was will- 
ing to sleep on the lounge or on the floor, and 
begged to stay, as I was not feeling well. But she 
insisted that she did not have accommodations for 
me, so I turned away. 



PIONEER HOSPITALITY 



75 



I crawled back into my "one-hoss shay," pulled 
up under a shade tree near the house and sobbed 
and rebelled, telling the Lord that I was going 
home, that I used to have a good deal more salary 
than I was getting now and had a place to stay 
every night. While I was thus rebelling a small 
voice said: 

"Sulzer, what are you doing this for? Are you 
better than the Son of Man, who had not a place 
to lay his head?" 

Then I straightened up and told the Lord that 
if he would forgive me I would go on with my 
work. 

Just then the man of the house came in from 
the field, and, seeing me, said, "Hello, Mr. Sulzer, 
why don't you put up your horse and stay all 
night?" "Will it be convenient?" I asked. "Yes," 
he replied. "You go into the house and I will 
take care of the horse." But if ever I was anx- 
ious to take care of a horse it was then. I helped 
him unhitch and put the horse into the barn. Then 
once more he urged me to go into the house, as 
he had a few chores to do. I wanted to help 
him do the chores ; he didn't know what his 
wife had told me. In order to get rid of me, he 
went into the house with me. When he ushered 
me upstairs to my room that night there were 
two empty beds — and I sleep in only one at a 
time. 

The next morning when the Sunday school was 
organized this good woman was elected secretary 
and treasurer. 



76 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

After a meeting one afternoon I went home with 
some people who had invited me. When I saw 
that supper was nearly ready — I could see easily, 
as the dining room, kitchen, library and living 
room were all in one — I asked if I might wash. 
At the mother's suggestion a little girl about ten 
went out into the barnyard and brought in a six- 
quart pan that had been set out with sour milk 
for the chickens. Then I washed. 

When we came to the supper table I noticed 
the tea pot; it was different from most of those 
we have now. The cover, the handle and the 
spout hadn't got on it yet. It was a two-quart 
fruit can! The coffee pot the next morning was 
of the same patent. 

That night we went five miles to the meeting. 
It was cold, dark and blustery, and we took all 
the bedclothes in the house in which to wrap up 
the children. During the meeting it rained and 
sleeted, and the bedclothes were wet through. 
When we reached home at eleven o'clock we 
warmed ourselves and dried the bedclothes by a 
hay fire; the man would bring in a fork of hay 
and I would twist it up and throw it on the blaze. 
(There was not a stick of wood or a pound of coal 
in the house.) It was nearly three o'clock when 
the mother of the family thought the bedclothes 
were dry enough. They gave me the spare bed — 
it was the only bed in the house — and the rest of 
them slept on the floor. 

The school organized there lived all winter, and 
the next spring I had a letter from my hostess, 



PIONEER HOSPITALITY yy 

asking me to visit them and hold a Sunday meet- 
ing soon. The promise was made that my ex- 
penses would be paid. When the time came the 
schoolhouse was crowded and they had to pull up 
the wagons to the windows so that they could sit 
outside and hear. The people came from twenty 
miles around. One wagonload of folks came with 
dinner in a clothes basket. 

After the dinner my host said: 

"Friends, I promised Brother Sulzer that if he 
would come and hold this meeting to-day we 
would pay all his expenses. We will take a col- 
lection now. His expenses are four dollars." 

They went all over the house and around the 
crowd outside; then they counted the cash. They 
took another collection and counted that, and an- 
other collection and counted that. When they 
started around the fourth time I said: 

"Hold on there, how much have you?" 

"We have one dollar and fifty-two cents." 

"I am glad you have that much. I would rather 
talk to you the rest of the time than take collec- 
tions." 

We had a splendid meeting. While this little 
Sunday school never grew into a church it was all 
the religious training those boys and girls had, 
and so it meant much to them. 

The ninety-year-old grandmother of one of the 
boys told me that the Sunday school had brought 
back her Christian faith. She knit lace collars and 
sold them for fifty cents each to earn money for 
missions. A short time after I was there she gave 



78 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

five dollars for home missions and ten dollars to 
foreign missions, and later sent me six dollars for 
my missionary work, all earned in that way. I 
afterwards met one of her grandsons in South 
Dakota, and was glad to find he was an elder in 
the church there. 



One day I drove up to a log cabin and invited 
the family out to a meeting the next night. The 
head of the family promised to take all his folks. 
Then he asked me to put up my horse and stay 
all night. When I asked him if it would be con- 
venient, he said they would find a peg to hang 
me on. 

Seeing the small log house, and quite a number 
around, I wondered where they would put me. 
When night came I was taken upstairs to a room 
where there were four beds. The family consisted 
of father, mother, two daughters, one son and a 
"school ma'am." But in the small log house there 
was plenty of room to entertain the missionary. 
There is always room where the hearts of the peo- 
ple are large enough, or where they are interested 
in the Lord's work. 

* * * 

Once when I had an appointment about thirty 
miles from home, on the railroad, to conduct a 
series of meetings, Mrs. Sulzer was taken quite 
sick. I provided for her comfort, and went down 
at the appointed time to say that I could not con- 
duct the meetings on account of her sickness. 



PIONEER HOSPITALITY 79 

After I reached there a terrible storm came up 
and the railroad was completely blockaded, so that 
I could not get home. I conducted the meetings 
from night to night, having it understood that 
whenever the train came through I must go home. 
I was snowed in for ten days and unable to get 
any word from home. We had good meetings 
and there were fifteen conversions. 

Then I was so nervous that I started home 
afoot. I walked two thirds of the way, breaking 
through many a time as I passed over snowdrifts 
as big as a house. Just at dark, when twelve 
miles from home, I came to the home of friends. 
I intended to go on my way that night, but the 
good Samaritan insisted I must stay until morn- 
ing. 

I started on after breakfast, and reached my 
home at half-past twelve. At one o'clock the 
first train arrived ! Through the kindness of 
the neighbors Mrs. Sulzer had had all necessary 
care. 

Some months afterwards a gentleman stopped 
me on the road and told me that I had spoiled his 
work when I held the meetings during the snow- 
storm. He explained that he was a detective for 
the railroad and had gone to detect thieves who 
were stealing out of the yards by the wagonload. 
He had his case all ready and was about to arrest 
them when I started the meetings. But the thieves 
were at the meetings night after night. As none of 
them ever came back to the yard, he could not 
make his arrests and so lost his case. 



8o PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

During some meetings I held in a country neigh- 
borhood in Iowa the young people in one family 
became much interested and one daughter de- 
cided for Christ. The father and mother were un- 
believers. One evening these young people took 
me home with them. 

The parents had already retired when we reached 
the house. I had a good talk with the young peo- 
ple. The door to the parents' room was partly 
open, and they no doubt heard my conversation. 
In the morning, while waiting for breakfast, the 
father said, "You are setting up the children 
against the parents." I told him I did not intend 
to do so. Just then the daughter came into the 
room. I called her by name and asked her if she 
did not love her father and mother just as much 
after becoming a Christian as before. She said, 
very emphatically, "Yes, indeed I do, and a great 
deal more." 

In the afternoon, before we started to the meet- 
ing, I had prayer with one of the boys in the barn, 
and he suggested that I leave my horse and they 
would take me with them over to the place where 
the afternoon meeting was to be held. After the 
meeting I was invited to another house for sup- 
per. While there the boy brought my horse and 
cutter, as the parents had told him that they did 
not want me on their premises any longer. The 
good work in that family went on, the daughter, 
especially, being a determined and consecrated 
Christian, and all came out right between the fam- 
ily and myself. 




Looking for their friend the 
Sabbath-school Missionary. 



An _ outgrowth of Sabbath-school 

missions. Presbyterian Church 

at Otter Creek, Minnesota. 




The Presbyterian 



arise, chapel and the pastor with his family, 
at Souris, North Dakota. 



PIONEER HOSPITALITY 8 1 

Not long after, as I was driving along in that 
neighborhood with another Sunday-school mission- 
ary, I felt that I ought to call in to see Mr. W., 
who had attended the meetings. We met him out 
in the barnyard. I told him we had come to see 
whether he was ready to give his heart to the 
Lord. I had my hand on one shoulder, my friend 
put his hand on the other, and we had a word of 
prayer standing. When he got into the house he 
was raging and told his wife that if those Phari- 
sees ever stepped inside his house he would use 
his boots on them. 

That night at the meeting — with his consent — 
we decided to have an afternoon prayer meeting 
at his house the next day. There were thirty-two 
present that afternoon. Before the close of the 
meeting he rose up and said, "I want to tell you 
that you don't need to waste any more prayers 
on me, for it won't do any good." When he sat 
down I asked them all to kneel and pray for him. 
That night he took a stand for Christ. After the 
meeting he invited us most heartily to come and 
stay at his house for the rest of the time that we 
held meetings; he said that we could do our pray- 
ing standing, kneeling or sitting, just as we pleased. 
He was a faithful Christian man thereafter. There 
were forty-six conversions at the meetings. The 
community, which would not allow religious serv- 
ices in the schoolhouse before, but had infidel 
meetings only, was completely changed. 
* * * 

About a month after the close of the meetings 



82 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

I was within ten miles of this place, visiting among 
the families. That day I could not find a place to 
stay. At one place the man told me he had no 
room for my horse, though he had a big red barn, 
and I knew there was always a way to make room 
for one more horse in a place like that. At the 
next place there were too many dogs inside the 
gate, so I did not dare to go to the house. Then 
I thought I would stay with one of my German 
minister friends. When I rang the bell he came 
around the house, but did not even ask me in. 
We talked so long I got cold and chilly, as well 
as hungry. It was about nine o'clock and I had 
had no supper. 

Three miles further on I found a man who had 
just driven up to the front door to take in the 
women to go to a meeting at a neighbor's house. 
On seeing me he said he thought he would put 
up the team and stay at home. But I said we 
would put up my horse and I would go with him. 
He objected that I had eaten no supper. I as- 
sured him I could eat when we came back from 
the meeting. I learned later that he had been 
delayed nearly an hour; had had trouble in hitch- 
ing up one of his horses. It was a fortunate delay 
for me. 

The meeting to which we went lasted until two 
o'clock in the morning. I tried to close it three 
times, but it wouldn't close. There were five con- 
versions, among them some that could not be 
reached during the meetings that were previously 
held at the schoolhouse. I could see then why 



PIONEER HOSPITALITY 83 

the Lord had closed up all the other homes and 
sent me there. I had supper about three o'clock 
in the morning. 

A year or more later, in South Dakota, I called 
on Mr. W., who had moved there. I asked him 
what he was doing for the Lord. He said there 
was nothing to do ; that it was of no use to try to 
have a Sunday school there. I went to visit the 
day school, where I found quite a number of chil- 
dren. When the teacher called on me to address 
them I asked them, whether they would like a 
Bible school and they all said they would. So I 
appointed an hour for them to meet on the next 
Sunday. I could not be there myself, so I ap- 
pointed a committee of three among the children 
to go and ask Mr. W. to teach them at that hour. 

Then I went back to his house and told him 
what had been done. He said he would not teach 
in the Sunday school. "Well," said I, "I want you 
to promise that you will go there next Sunday 
and look those children square in the eyes and 
tell them that you won't teach them." The re- 
sult was he went on with the Sunday school. In 
less than three months he organized another school 
and superintended them both. He always lived a 
devout Christian life, and his children followed 
their father's example. 



THE PERSONAL TOUCH 



CHAPTER VIII 
THE PERSONAL TOUCH 

Once when driving to an appointment about 
twelve miles from the railroad station I came upon 
a team hitched to a two-seated wagon standing in 
the middle of the road. It was headed for the 
station, eight miles away, and it was getting late. 
There was a man sitting on a side embankment 
smoking his pipe. It was difficult to pass his team. 
Said I: 

"Hello there, what are you sitting there for? You 
are eight miles from home and it is getting dark. 
Why don't you drive on?" 

"I can't. I've got a hot box," he replied. 

He had not oiled up that morning, the axle had 
become hot, and that was what set the wheel. 

And the man sat also. 

My partner was driving on. Said I: 

"Just hold a minute. I will go back and help 
this fellow out. It won't do to leave him there 
all night." 

I went up to his wagon and said: 

"You come down here. Get that monkey 
wrench, take off that burr, and now let's both get 
hold of the wheel." 

We pulled, but the wheel did not budge a bit. 
I told him it was coming. I always talk encour- 
agingly when a man is in trouble. At the second 
87 



88 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

pull it did not budge a bit. I again insisted it 
was coming. I was in hopes it would. The third 
time I said: 

"Now — together — pull!" 

And the wheel came off. The fact is, that man 
pulled the wheel off alone, as I didn't pull an 
ounce. I only talked encouragingly and he did 
the work. 

I hadn't thought of this incident for years, when 
at a meeting of some church leaders I was called 
on to give a report of my work. This incident 
flashed into my mind. After I had told it I said : 
"Now you fellows have done the work. I just 
talked encouragingly and you pulled the wheel 
off." 

* * * 

One day Mr. Wright and I were invited out to 
dinner by a woman who was a professing Chris- 
tian, but her husband was not, and she gave us 
to understand that we had better not say anything 
to him in regard to religion, as he might not take 
it kindly. After a pleasant visit and a good din- 
ner we concluded to go around the lake for a lit- 
tle hunt, and before we started one of us suggested 
that we have a short Scripture reading and a word 
of prayer. Before kneeling I put my hand on the 
husband's shoulder and said, "Now, John, just give 
your heart to the Lord while we pray." 

He came to church that night without his wife, 
and, when returning home, on passing a little 
wood, he felt impelled to go into the grove and 
pray. He did so, and as he arose he felt so light 



THE PERSONAL TOUCH 89 

and happy that he hardly knew what had come 
over him. All at once it dawned upon him that 
he had accepted Christ and that his sins were for- 
given. When he reached home he waked his wife 
and told her the story. The next evening, at our 
meeting, he related the incident of the night be- 
fore and gave a rousing testimony of how the Lord 
had forgiven his sins. He was afterwards made 
an officer in the church which we organized im- 
mediately following this series of meetings. 
* * * 

On the train at one time I felt impressed that 
I ought to speak to a gentleman who sat in the 
seat in front of me. Finding that he was a con- 
tractor in South Dakota and that he had been up 
near Devil's Lake, we talked of the country. He 
was very enthusiastic about it, and spoke of the 
bright prospects of that country. 

After a while I spoke to him about his soul's 
salvation, and the prospects for eternity. He was 
a little inclined to be an unbeliever, but when I 
came to my station and bade him good-by he 
handed me a five-dollar bill, and said he had never 
had a man talk to him who came so near his heart. 
That was the last I saw of the man. I hope the 
seed-sowing was not fruitless. 

* * * 

While driving along one day I saw a man chop- 
ping wood by the side of his house. I felt im- 
pressed that I ought to speak to him about his 
soul's salvation, so I hitched my horse and intro- 
duced myself. Then I said, "Are you a Christian?" 
7 



90 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

He straightened up and replied that I had better 
go into the house and talk to the women. I told 
him that I would like to talk to the women, but 
that I was after him just now. He pointed two 
miles off to a church steeple, and said: 

"Do you see that church steeple down there? 
I want you to understand that I pay that preacher 
down there five dollars a year and my women at- 
tend his meetings. If my soul isn't saved that 
preacher is responsible." I pitied the preacher as 
well as himself. And there are many who have the 
same idea of getting saved. 

* * * 

During a series of meetings I became much in- 
terested in a big, young man who attended every 
night. His sister was a member of our church, 
but was not very active. She promised to take 
hold of the work and do something for the Mas- 
ter. 

One night the pastor of the church and myself 
were invited to take a little lunch at the home of 
the girl. Her family was the wealthiest in town, 
and they had a beautiful home. While we were 
sitting there the young man in whom I was in- 
terested came in and went upstairs. When she 
told me he was her brother, I said to her that she 
had a good subject in him to work on. She prom- 
ised to use her influence to help win him to Christ. 

After he was converted I found out that this 
young man had been away in another state, and 
would draw on his father for quite large sums of 
monev — five hundred to a thousand dollars at a 




A Sunday-school picnic at New Prague, Minnesota. 




Sunday-school Institute at Slaughter Schoolhouse, Montrail County, 
North Dakota. 



THE PERSONAL TOUCH 91 

time. His father at first thought he was putting 
it into business, but later found out that he was 
gambling and had told the young man that he 
disowned him. The young man had come home 
to try to make up, was happily converted and his 
father forgave him. His sister became an active 
church worker. 

Driving over the prairie one day I passed a 
schoolhouse just as school was out, and I invited 
some of the boys into my "one-hoss shay," as they 
were going my way. I had nine of them, and we 
were having a good time as we rode along. I 
asked one little fellow, about nine years old, if he 
loved Jesus. "I don't know the man," was his 
reply. He had never heard about Jesus. I told 
him I would be back in a few weeks to see what 
I could do to help him learn about Jesus. 

I came back in a few weeks and helped organ- 
ize a Sunday school, and as there was no Chris- 
tian in the district we elected a good woman for 
superintendent. In about a month or six weeks 
I received word from her that the people were 
crowding in and filling the schoolhouse chuck full. 
She asked me to come to her assistance. I got 
there on Sunday quite a little time before the Sun- 
day-school hour, but she was there. We were 
alone for some time, and in talking things over 
she told me she thought the superintendent and 
teachers ought to be Christians. I told her I 
thought so myself, and thought so when she was 
elected, and added: 



92 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

"You just kneel down right here and give your 
heart to the Lord." 

She did so, and the school had a Christian super- 
intendent right away. She united with the church 
and lived an exemplary Christian life. 



One day I saw a young woman sitting in the seat 
behind me on the railway car. I felt impressed that 
I ought to speak to her, but it was quite embar- 
rassing to do so. But after a while I got up cour- 
age and asked her where she lived. She gave me 
the name of the town and her own name and told 
me that she was going to South Dakota to hold 
down a claim and to teach school. 

Then I reminded her that there was no Sunday 
school where she was going. When she said she 
knew this, I told her she must have one when she 
opened her school. She said she had never taught 
in Sunday school, so I said: 

''But you will have to do it now, and, further- 
more, right here I elect you superintendent and 
assistant and secretary and treasurer. And I 
will send you the necessary helps for the 
school." 

Finally she promised she would do as I asked. 
Only a few months afterwards I received a letter 
from her saying that they had forty-seven in the 
Sunday school, preaching every two weeks, and 
were looking forward to a church organization — 
and all this was the outcome of improving a little 
opportunity. 



THE PERSONAL TOUCH 93 

After organizing a Sunday school I was asked 
to send helps and supplies. The people present 
said they would send me the money. I sent the 
supplies and helps, but they forgot to send me the 
money. Three years after, when standing on the 
platform of a depot about three miles from where 
the treasurer of this school lived, I thought I would 
make the wait pay. I had three hours to wait for 
the train, so I decided to go down and get the three 
dollars and fifty cents they owed me. 

I took a bee line across the prairie. On the way 
I saw a man plowing in the field, and something 
said to me, "Sulzer, talk to that man about his 
soul." I was in a hurry and I said, "Not now." 
The second time something said, "Go and talk to 
that man about his soul." But I said, "When I 
come back I will." The third time something said 
to me, "Talk to that man about his soul." Where- 
upon, I ran over to where tie was, halted him and 
asked him, "Are you a Christian?" He stopped 
his team and said he didn't know. I told him he 
had better find out. 

During the conversation that followed he told 
me that he sometimes felt that he ought to be a 
Christian, and that he thought if it were not for 
his wife he might be a Christian. Usually the 
difficulty is on the other side. I asked him if his 
wife was at home. He pointed down to the house; 
there she was, washing. He left his team stand- 
ing in the field, and we both went to the house. 

When we got into the house I saw three beau- 
tiful children. "Are those children yours?" I 



94 



PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 



asked. "Then don't you know that those children 
need a praying father and a praying mother?" 
After I talked with them about their soul's salva- 
tion they both kneeled down and gave their hearts 
to the Lord. They had both been afraid, as is 
often the case, to talk to each other about this 
most important matter. 

When I was ready to go it was nearly train time, 
so I rushed back to the depot without seeing the 
treasurer. And I still have the money for the sup- 
plies coming to me ! 

* * * 

In Chicago one day a man told me I ought to go 
down to a little town in Illinois, where there was 
no Sunday school or church service of any kind, 
and see if I could not plant a Sunday school there; 
he was alarmed about his nieces and nephews who 
were living there. I told him I would go. As 
soon as I could do so I went to the place and found 
a town of twelve hundred people. After securing 
a room by the week I started my visitation. I 
gave notice for a meeting on the next Sunday, at 
the same time keeping my eye open for the proper 
person for superintendent. But after visiting from 
house to house for two days and a half I had seen 
no person that I thought was fit for the office. 

After dinner on the third day I rang the bell 
of a house on the hill and a young lady of about 
thirty summers met me at the door. The first 
impression I got was that she was the right one 
for superintendent, so I told her she was the girl 
I wanted for superintendent of the Sunday school 



THE PERSONAL TOUCH 95 

I was trying to organize. She told me I was 
wrong; that she would not superintend a Sunday 
school. I told her that she would, but she in- 
sisted that she would not, so I simply said that I 
would tell the people as I went along that I had 
found a superintendent. 

They all thought she would make a splendid 
officer. When Sunday came she was elected, but 
absolutely refused to act, so we couldn't do any- 
thing that day. But I told them I would remain 
in town till they should organize a Sunday school, 
and the sooner they organized the sooner they 
would get rid of me. I announced that there would 
be another service the next Sunday. They organ- 
ized quick that day. The young woman was again 
elected superintendent, and made a most excellent 
leader. The next winter I went to the town and 
held meetings. There were fifteen conversions, the 
superintendent's own sister being among those de- 
ciding for Christ at that time. 

* * * 

I had quite a lesson taught me by some boys, 
as it showed me how children will not only watch 
the parents, but also their Sunday-school teachers 
during the week. One winter the young people in 
in our town were getting up a play for the benefit 
of a church. A friend sent two tickets to our home. 
Mrs. Sulzer thought we ought to go. I did not 
want to refuse, but hoped something would happen 
so that we could not go. 

Nothing happened, so when the evening came 
we were both ready. When we got down town I 



96 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

looked at my watch and saw that it was nearly 
an hour ahead of time. I asked Mrs. Sulzer to 
wait for me at the office of a friend while I went 
to the post office to get the mail. On the way I 
had to pass the opera house. Three boys were 
standing on the sidewalk at the foot of the stairs, 
none of them over ten years old. When they saw 
me coming I heard one of them say, "There comes 
Mr. Sulzer!" Another said, "You won't catch him 
upstairs!" And the third said, "You bet your 
boots you won't." As I passed on I said to myself, 
"Lord, take those boys home before I come to go 
upstairs," and when we got ready to enter the build- 
ing the boys had disappeared. 

While we sat there waiting for the curtain to 
go up something occurred at the rear of the hall, 
and everybody looked around. Two young women 
from the Bible class were sitting in front of us 
and they saw me. The one put her hand up to 
her face and said: "Jenny, we're all right. Mr. 
Sulzer is just behind us." 

Soon after that I looked up the three boys and 
found they were from homes where there was no 
Bible or Christian influence, and they had no re- 
ligious instruction except what they received in 
the Sunday school. The remarks of these boys 
showed the influence of the Sunday school in de- 
veloping higher standards. 



THE WEAK BECOME STRONG 



CHAPTER IX 
THE WEAK BECOME STRONG 

Hearing - of a northern town, the terminus of 
a railroad, that had no Sunday school or church, 
I took the train and arrived there in due time. 
Inquiring for the hotel, I was told how to find it. 
I was glad there was an identifying sign on the 
building. It was a log cabin. When I entered 
I found some fifteen woodsmen sitting around, 
smoking their pipes; if it had not been for the 
sign I would have thought it was a smokehouse 
instead of a hotel. I registered, told the landlord 
I would be back after a while, and worked my way 
to the door to get some fresh air. It was quite 
fresh, for the thermometer registered between 
twenty-five and thirty below zero. 

I saw two or three children coasting down the 
hill, and I proceeded to get acquainted with them. 
Then I gave them each a Sunday-school card and 
told them to coast on. When I went to the near- 
est house and the good woman came to the door 
I supposed, of course, she would ask me in, but 
she didn't. I had put my foot up on the doorsill, 
and I kept it there for fear the wind might blow 
the door shut. I asked questions. By and by 
the door knob began to rattle, and a neighbor 
who was sitting inside began to pull up her shawl. 
They were quite anxious to shut the door, as they 
99 



IOo PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

were getting cold, but I hadn't finished my visit, 
so I kept my foot on the doorsill. Finally the 
woman asked me to go in. After I stepped in 
the neighbor woman asked me where I was stop- 
ping. When she learned that I was at the hotel 
she called it an awful place and asked me to stop 
at her house while in the town. I accepted quickly, 
but said I would take supper with the men at the 
hotel, in order to get them out to the meeting. 

That evening I organized a Sunday school. I 
had intended to go away the next morning, but I 
was a little afraid that my school wouldn't last 
until Sunday if I didn't stay with it. 

When Sunday came none of the officers elected 
would act, so I reorganized the school. We bor- 
rowed a woman from the next town to superin- 
tend it, and I remained three weeks, holding serv- 
ices every day and sometimes twice a day. 

We secured a lot for the church, and the pastor 
from our nearest church — seventy miles away — 
came and organized the church. Soon afterwards 
a building was put up, and it is a self-supporting 
church to-day. This good woman told me that 
up to the time I came they had had but one sermon 
in the twelve years she had lived in the town; that 
was preached by a minister who stayed over Sun- 
day when on his way through the place. 

I visited one little town with the intention of 
organizing a Sunday school there, but the people 
were all foreigners and there was no one to lead. 
I watched the place for fourteen years, when 



THE WEAK BECOME STRONG ioi 

finally I heard that several promising families had 
moved in. At once I wrote to one of the women, 
who was a member of the Presbyterian church in 
another place, saying that I would be there the 
next Sunday to see about organizing a school. 

Before going to the schoolhouse I called on 
her. She told me that she had received my letter 
and called the women of the town together to see 
what could be done in the way of organizing a 
school, but they had decided that they could not do 
it, because there was no one there for superintendent, 
and the people would not come out anyway. I asked 
her if she didn't know that I had decided to have 
a Sunday school, and also that she would be super- 
intendent. Of course she did not know it, and she 
said she was unwilling. I merely told her that I 
would see her about it later on. 

We had a fine audience at the schoolhouse, and 
when the meeting was over the school was organ- 
ized and this woman was elected superintendent. 
Our neighboring pastor went to preach for them. 
They paid him two hundred dollars a year; this 
payment helped to make his little church self-sup- 
porting. One of our missionaries and I went out 
the following winter and held meetings, at which 
there were fifteen conversions. 
* * * 

After organizing a church in a town of three 
or four hundred, where there was no English 
church and no English Sunday school, I conducted 
some evangelistic meetings for a few weeks and 
secured money for the erection of a church build- 



102 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

ing. While busy with these meetings I heard of 
a new town to the north, where there were large 
stone quarries, but where there was no church or 
Sunday school. I was told that this new town 
was a hard proposition, but I felt impressed that 
I ought to go there, and so closed my meetings 
two days earlier than I had intended. 

I arrived about twelve o'clock, and stopped at 
the first house I came to, not knowing one per- 
son from another. It happened to be the right 
place for my errand. I found an excellent Chris- 
tian woman, a Scotch Presbyterian. I told her 
I was a Sunday-school missionary, and had come 
to see what I could do to help them get a Sunday 
school started. She was delighted with the idea. 
Then I went off to see the man who had the right 
to let me have the schoolhouse. 

I secured the schoolhouse and invited some of 
the quarry men to come out. They promised to 
come, and did. I organized a Sunday school the 
following Sunday, and then held two weeks' serv- 
ices. During the services Dr. Adams came and 
organized a Presbyterian church, which has been 
self-supporting for some years. 
* * * 

One day I received a letter from a woman, stat- 
ing that a certain town had had neither Sunday 
school nor preaching service of any kind for some 
time. She said that the American Sunday School 
Union had tried in vain to have a school, and 
that two denominations had also failed. At the 
first opportunity I went to this town, and while 



THE WEAK BECOME STRONG 103 

I was looking the place over two or three busi- 
ness men were looking me over. I had fully de- 
cided that something ought to be done. 

After I had made my plans, and was fully con- 
vinced that these were some of the men who had 
driven out the other Sunday schools, I asked them 
if I could not have the schoolhouse for Sunday 
school the next Sunday. They looked at each 
other, then one spoke. He told me that if I would 
get each voter in the district to sign a petition, 
and would give bonds for the schoolhouse, and 
pay so much a Sunday, he thought I could get the 
house. I looked him square in the eye and said: 
"Do- you see any green in my eyes? Do you sup- 
pose I have time to waste in that way? How much 
is the rent of that dancing- hall over there? Will 
you let me have it for next Sunday if I pay for it?" 

"I guess you can have it," they said. 

"Thank you, it is engaged." 

The next Sunday, after my service and the or- 
ganization of a Sunday school, I went to the rear 
of the store where the men were playing cards 
and asked how much the rent of the dance hall 
was for the month. They said five dollars. I paid 
it and said I would be back when the month was 
up. When the month was about up I wrote to 
one of the business men and told him if they would 
let me have the hall free of charge we would hold 
some special meetings. When I came he handed 
me the key and we went on with the meetings. 

During the three weeks' meetings there was one 
very stormy night, when not a woman came out, 



104 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

but these men were all there. Before we dismissed 
that evening we had four hundred and fifty dol- 
lars pledged toward a church building. After 
three weeks we closed the meetings with a church 
organized. Enough money was raised — with the 
help of the Board of Church Erection — to put up a 
good church building. I understand they have a 
new manse now. 

* * * 

In a destitute town I held the first religious 
service and organized the first Sunday school they 
ever had. I went back to visit it a short time 
afterwards while I was looking after a school thir- 
teen miles south of there. The teams were not 
very plenty, and the roads, if any, were poor, so 
when I saw a freight train moving north I jumped 
on. I rode in a coal car eight miles, then walked 
five miles through the woods and reached my 
school in time to encourage them. In the even- 
ing I held a service and had a good audience. 

After the meeting an elderly man came up to 
shake hands with me, and said: 

"Glad you came. I have not been in a church 
for years, and you and I don't think just alike 
about this matter, but I heard how you came in 
here to-day, and I thought if you were that kind 
of fellow I would come and hear you. Let me 
know a little beforehand the next time you come 
and I will have a houseful for you. Come around 
in the morning and I'll give you the best lot in 
town to build a church on." 

I thanked him, and accepted. A lady standing 




*\r 



Mm® 1 1 




Grace Presbyterian Church, Minneapolis, Minnesota. 




Presbyterian Church and Manse at Lewiston, Minnesota. 



THE WEAK BECOME STRONG 105 

near spoke up and promised ten dollars for the 
lumber, and a man offered fifty dollars. I accepted 
the gifts, and informed them that Dr. Adams 
would be on hand soon to see what could be done. 
A series of meetings was held soon afterwards and a 
church was organized. 

* * * 

I heard of a mining town where they had no 
Sunday school, so I went there and organized one. 
We had the meeting in the city hall and a new- 
comer was elected superintendent. But he moved 
away in a month or six weeks, and that brought 
the Sunday school to a close. They objected to 
the hall being used again, so there was no place 
to meet, even if the people had wanted to con- 
tinue the school. 

I wrote to some of the people there, asking 
them to let me know how soon they could secure 
a place to continue the school, but, not getting a 
favorable reply, after a few months I went back. I 
secured a store building, borrowed an organ, re- 
organized the school and held three weeks' meet- 
ings. Then Dr. Adams came and organized a 
Presbyterian church, securing the promise of a 
lot for the church building. The school and church 
have been flourishing ever since. 

The only opposition I had to the opening of 
the school was from a woman. She was confined 
to bed all the time I was there; thus I had clear 
sailing to establish the school. One of the mer- 
chants who had told me that nothing could be done 
there became interested. I had him put in for 
8 



106 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

superintendent, and afterwards he was elected an 
elder in the church which we organized. 

* * * 

My attention was directed to a small town north 
of Minneapolis, where we had a little church and 
Sunday school. When I reached town and in- 
quired for some of the workers I found a young 
man who told me that they had had a meeting 
a few nights before and wondered to whom they 
could write to get permission to use the Presby- 
terian church building for their Union Sunday 
school. The Presbyterians had not had a pastor 
for a year and a half, and so no services or Sun- 
day school were held. He said he was so glad 
I had come. I informed him that I was not out 
to rent Presbyterian churches, but to encourage 
the little churches and schools. ''Why," said he, 
"our little school here is Union and we wanted 
to see whether we could buy the Presbyterian 
church." I told him I wasn't sent out to sell 
Presbyterian churches. 

I put up notices that gospel services would be 
held that night in the Presbyterian church and 
that all were invited. I held services for over two 
weeks, and when Dr. Adams came a number were 
received into the church. Both the church and 
Sunday school were revived, and I am glad to 
say that the building was not sold. The good 
work has been moving on ever since. 

* * * 

A promising railroad town about ten miles from 
the county seat was without a church or Sunday 



THE WEAK BECOME STRONG 107 

school. A Scotch-Irish Presbyterian had moved 
into the near-by country, bringing a family of five 
sons and one daughter. They, with others, wanted 
a Sunday school in town, but needed a little en- 
couragement in starting the new school. 

The Baldwin fund of twenty-five dollars was 
available, so supplies and hymn books were granted 
for a year with the understanding that they would 
try to keep the school going. The old school- 
house was used as a meeting place for quite 
a while Then special services were held, which 
were very successful and made possible the or- 
ganization of a church seventeen months after the 
school was started. They now have a beautiful 
house of worship, Sunday school and regular 
preaching services with resident minister. 
* * * 

A few years ago a young lady wanted to invest 
twenty-five dollars in the work. I advised her to 
use it in having a Sunday school established in 
some needy place. One of our missionaries found 
a place where there was no school. The people 
were mostly Unitarians, but were glad to have 
the school started for the children. The money 
was used for supplies. With this encouragement 
the people became interested, took hold of the 
work and in a few years a church was organized. 
They now have a church building costing twenty- 
five hundred dollars. A large paper mill has since 
been located there, and the Presbyterian church 
is on the field, ready for newcomers. Where can 
we get as much in return for small investment? 



INFIDELITY ON THE RUN 



CHAPTER X 
INFIDELITY ON THE RUN 

There is no genuine infidel. One day, in my 
search for needy places where the gospel had been 
neglected, I found a neighborhood where a school 
was much needed. I called on one of the leading 
families and made my errand known; I was there 
to assist in establishing a Sunday school. The 
good woman was very prompt to answer. She 
said there was no use to try to have a Sunday 
school, or any other religious services, while a 
certain man was living in that vicinity, as he was 
one of the most radical infidels and would come 
down quickly on anything that was of a religious 
nature. When I proposed to visit the neighbor- 
hood from house to house she said I had better 
not go near him because he was a very cruel man, 
and if I should say anything to him about Sunday 
school he might knock me down. I promised her 
I would be careful when I called there. 

When I got to the place I was glad I could run, 
if necessary; the knowledge of my ability gave me 
courage to tackle this terrible man, whom I saw 
busy in the barnyard. As I approached him my 
knees shook, but I called him by name, gave him 
a hearty handshake, told him I was glad to see 
him, and made him feel as if his old country cousin 
had come to see him. Then I said: 
in 



H2 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

"I am a Sunday-school missionary and am 
around here to see what I can do to establish a 
Sunday school." 

He replied promptly, "I wish you would." 

My knees straightened up quickly and I asked 
him why he wished this. 

"Why, Mr. Sulzer," he said, "if you knew what 
a mean set of neighbors are living here you 
wouldn't ask such a question. This is one of the 
worst neighborhoods you ever struck, and the boys 
are perfect little sneak thieves. For the last two 
or three years I haven't been able to raise any 
watermelons, and I wish that you would start a 
Sunday school." 

The school was organized the next Sunday and 
the boys proved to be better than their reputa- 
tion. Even the testimony of infidels goes to prove 
that Sunday schools are a means causing boys to 
be better and grow up to be trusty men. 
* * * 

One of the first suggestions I made to the 
Board was the planting of Bible schools out around 
our little home mission churches and putting in 
our own literature in these little schools. In this 
way we would make our weak home mission 
churches self-supporting. This plan has been car- 
ried out very successfully in Minnesota. 

For example, there was a little church that for 
about thirty years had been drawing home mis- 
sion aid of from two to four hundred dollars a 
year. I organized a little Sunday school about 
six and a half miles southeast. As there were no 



INFIDELITY ON THE RUN 113 

Christians in this district, I had to go six miles 
the other way to get one of our elders. With his 
daughter he came over six miles to superintend 
the school. Each fall, when the cold weather came, 
they would close the school for the season, and 
I had to go back each spring and start them up 
again. 

The third time I reorganized the school I told 
the superintendent that I wished he would let me 
know when the time came to close the school, as 
I would like to come and see how it was done. 
I told him I had opened a good many schools, 
but I had never seen one closed. In September 
I received a card that read something like this: 

"According to the agreement, I notify you that 
on the last Sunday of this month we will close 
the school for the season. We would be very 
glad to have you with us." 

When the time came I went, reaching his home 
Saturday afternoon. After supper I suggested to 
him that perhaps it might be a good idea to con- 
tinue the school instead of closing it the next 
day, but he couldn't see it that way. We had 
quite a discussion, but I saw that it was useless 
to argue (since he was Scotch and I was German). 
As I always like to give in when I can carry my 
point I didn't say anything more about it. 

The next day after the lesson he said: 

"Brother Sulzer is with us to-day, and we will 
be glad to have a word from him before we close 
for the season." 

I tried to show them the excellent work he and 



114 



PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 



his daughter were doing. All at once I pointed to 
a young man and said: 

"What is the matter with your helping to keep 
up this Sunday school this winter? Will you?" 

"I guess so." 

"No guesswork; we want to know definitely. 
Will you?" 

"Yes." 

Then I took another young man and asked 
him the same question. He promised too. I 
said: 

"All in favor of carrying on this Sunday school 
this winter say 'Yes.' " 

And they all voted in favor of it, except my 
dear Scotch friend. 

When I sat down he got up and went for me 
as only a Scotchman can. Among other things 
he said : 

"I have six and a half miles to drive, and if I 
hitch my team out to that barbed wire fence dur- 
ing the winter, by the time Sunday school is over 
the team and all will be blown away." 

"What do you say to putting up some horse 
sheds where you can drive your teams in and have 
comfort?" I asked. "You build sheds for your 
pigs in the fall in order to keep them warm; you 
might do as well for your children to feed them 
on the Word of God. Fifty dollars will build a 
horse shed. I will give five dollars." 

But there was no response, so I appointed a 
committee and put the daughter of the superin- 
tendent on as chairman of the committee to solicit, 



INFIDELITY ON THE RUN 115 

thinking she could begin at Jerusalem. Then I 
left an appointment for two weeks ahead. 

At the appointed time the pastor of the home 
mission church, six and a half miles away, went 
with me and we began meetings in the school- 
house. After the first meeting I called for a re- 
port from the committee. They reported eight 
and a half dollars collected. I told them that 
would not build a horse shed, but we would put 
up a wind-break. One man volunteered to bring 
the necessary lumber. I appointed one o'clock 
the next day as the time for the men to come with 
tools. About six o'clock we had the wind- 
break up. 

The meetings were continued for three weeks. 
At the close there were twenty-five conversions. 
Then the meetings were moved down to the little 
church in town and carried on three weeks longer. 
The first Sunday after the meetings closed seventy 
united with the Presbyterian church, and nearly 
as many with the Methodist church. One of the 
men who lived within a mile of the schoolhouse, 
but never came to Sunday school and never went 
to church in town, was converted and was after- 
wards superintendent and elder in the town church. 

After the close of the meetings I saw one of the 
elders, and suggested that as other churches had 
an eye on their pastor, it might be well to do bet- 
ter by him unless they wished to lose him. I fur- 
ther suggested that they call a congregational 
meeting and see what they could do. He prom- 
ised to do so. At the meeting the people made 



n6 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

provision for the entire eight hundred dollars' 
salary. This was the first time in thirty years the 
church had gone without aid from the Home Mis- 
sion Board. The next year a four-thousand-dollar 
church was built and paid for. The church has 
been self-supporting ever since. 
* * * 

While passing along one day I found a town in 
which most of the people were Scandinavians, with- 
out a church or a Sunday school of any kind. I 
at once went to work to see what could be done 
for them, at least for the children. I found one 
of the business men, a so-called infidel, who, I 
was informed, would oppose all such work. I got 
him interested and finally he told me to see an- 
other man, also an infidel, and that if he was in 
favor of a Sunday school I could have the hall at 
cost for the school. 

I found the other infidel and told him my mis- 
sion. He told me I had come to the wrong man; 
that he was the biggest sinner in town and took 
no stock in such things. Then I was informed 
that a Union missionary had been there on the 
same mission, and had left only ten minutes be- 
fore, giving it up as a hopeless case. I told him 
I was glad to know he was a sinner, for Christ 
came, not to call the righteous, but sinners to re- 
pentance, and he was therefore the man I was look- 
ing for. He at last told me he would let four of his 
children come to the Sunday school, and I finally 
got his promise that he would come also. 

We had a good meeting the next Sunday. The 




Rally Day service at Allen Sabbath school, North Dakota. There 
were nine baptisms at this service. 




Presbyterian Church at White Earth, North Dakota. 




Presbyterian Church at Thief River Falls, Minnesota 



INFIDELITY ON THE RUN 117 

hall was well filled. After the school was organ- 
ized my infidel friend came to me and gave me 
a dollar for gospel hymn books for the school; he 
said "he wanted the work to be a success." 

Some time later a letter from the secretary of 
the school said that the superintendent was a splen- 
did Christian man, that the hall was so crowded 
every Sunday they could not divide the school 
into classes, and that they hoped to have a larger 
place soon. 

* * * 

One Sunday I had an appointment in a German 
church. It was very rainy, so we decided we would 
not hold an evening service. I thought I would 
drive five miles beyond, where I had heard that 
Mrs. S. had started a Sunday school. Her hus- 
band's health failed when he was in business and 
so he had gone out and bought a farm, where he 
hoped to recover his health. 

On the morning of the first Sunday after they 
had moved to the farm Mrs. S. learned from her 
husband that there was neither church nor Sunday 
school in the neighborhood. She inquired who 
the school director was. She was told that he was 
an infidel who had driven out all the ministers who 
had come in to try to preach. 

She went to see the infidel, and asked him for 
the schoolhouse for Sunday. He told her she could 
have it. He thought she couldn't do any harm. 
The next Sunday morning after breakfast she 
asked her husband to hitch up and take the fam- 
ily to the schoolhouse. That first Sunday they 



Il8 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

were all alone, but the news soon spread around 
that there was a Sunday school, and others gath- 
ered in. To my surprise the school had grown 
to forty or fifty on that rainy Sunday when I called 
there just to encourage Mrs. S. 

I had never met her before. She pleaded with 
me to have an evening service, and I did. Then 
she wanted to have another service Monday night, 
and I held this. I did not think anybody would 
be out, but I wanted to encourage her. There 
was a fair-sized congregation. Then she begged 
for another meeting for Tuesday night, and finally 
I told her I would hold services the rest of the 
week. 

After I had held meetings for some nights the 
schoolhouse was filled and I decided to go and 
get Mr. Billings, the missionary for that district, 
who had been the means of getting me into the 
Sunday-school work. When I found him he did 
not want to go; he said it was a hard neighbor- 
hood, and that he didn't think anything could be 
done. But I told him to get into the buggy with 
me, and he did. 

The infidel, when he saw that the meetings were 
becoming quite interesting, came one evening with 
a bundle of leaflets, called "Contradictions of the 
Bible," and when we passed from the meeting to 
the after-meeting he distributed them all over the 
house, and then came and sat down on the plat- 
form with us. 

All the neighbors were worked up about his 
procedure and wanted me to go for him about the 



INFIDELITY ON THE RUN 



II 9 



matter. The next evening, after the meeting 
opened, he was there with another bundle of 
leaflets. Turning to the audience I said : "I went 
home last night all worked up over what this man 
did, and I turned to my Bible and found the Thirty- 
seventh Psalm. I have turned this man over to the 
Lord, and the Psalmist says, 'Fret not thyself be- 
cause of evil-doers, neither be thou envious against 
them that work unrighteousness.' Now notice what 
he says he will do with them, 'For they shall soon 
be cut down like the grass, and wither as the green 
herb.' And the Psalmist says to you and to me, 
'Trust in Jehovah and do good; dwell in the land, 
and feed on his faithfulness.' " The man never dis- 
tributed another tract or molested the meeting in 
any way. 

We carried on the meetings for a few weeks 
and had forty-six conversions. The Lord re- 
warded Mrs. S. for her faithfulness by the con- 
version of her own son, and he has been a very 
faithful worker in winning souls for Christ. For 
some years now he has been one of the district 
superintendents of the American Sunday School 
Union. 



THE LORD'S MEASURE 



CHAPTER XI 
THE LORD'S MEASURE 

While organizing - a Sunday school one hot June 
day where there were a fine lot of boys and girls 
from twelve to fifteen years old, I felt that they 
ought to have something more to read than merely 
papers. So I suggested that if they would raise 
twenty dollars I would put five with it and we 
would get a twenty-five-dollar library for these 
boys and girls. 

While I was raising the money a man in the 
audience rose and said: 

"I have been saving up money for the last four 
or five months, and was going over sometime this 
coming week to Neighbor B. to get a hive of bees, 
which would cost just five dollars, but I will give 
the five for the books for the children and let the 
bees go." 

"Thank you, my brother," I said. "You will 
get the honey just the same." 

This brother had two and a half miles to drive. 
When he reached home he found that somebody's 
bees had swarmed and settled right over the cen- 
ter of the outside door to his house, and he had 
to hive them before he could get into the house 
to get his dinner. When I went back with the 
books about a month afterwards he took me to 
his home and showed me the very spot where they 
123 



124 



PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 



had hung, and said it was the largest swarm he 
ever saw. I told him that he might have expected 
this ; that the Lord didn't do anything by halves. 

As a great many have questioned the truth of 
this story, I tell this sequel: 

At least twenty-five years after that summer I 
was attending a Sunday-school institute in another 
state, when an old gentleman with long white 
whiskers and hair asked me to sit down along- 
side him. He told me had come a long distance 
to hear me again; that he was from the county 
where the bee incident had occurred. "Don't you 
remember," he asked, "when you organized a Sun- 
day school in my schoolhouse, the brother who gave 
his last five dollars for the library, and how, when 
he got home, he found a swarm of bees hang- 
ing over his door? Don't you remember about 
him ?" 

At once I called Dr. Henry and Brother Fer- 
guson to come over and hear my friend tell the 
bee story. 

* * * 

Some years ago I went to a certain city with a 
missionary brother, who wished there was a school 
in a section of the city where there was no place in 
which to hold services. Finding a frame, one-room 
schoolhouse, I asked if this would not do. He said 
the school board would not allow it to be used for 
religious meetings. Later I saw a one-story, square 
building vacant, except for a billiard table in the 
center of the room. I asked him what was the mat- 
ter with renting this building for the school. He 



THE LORD'S MEASURE 125 

objected that it was a billiard hall and that the table 
was in the way. But I told him we would rent the 
building, put the table upside down in one corner, 
and put the primary class into it. We rented the 
building, started the Sunday school, and in three 
weeks' time the school board offered the brother the 
use of the schoolhouse free of charge. Two or three 
years later a church developed and the people of 
the neighborhood built a fine stone structure 
across the way from the schoolhouse. 
* * * 

I was afterwards invited to the same city to 
conduct a series of meetings. We started the 
meetings in a store building down town, but by 
the end of the week the building was too small 
and the skating rink was secured. There the meet- 
ings were continued for three weeks. We had ap- 
pointed a committee to look after the finances and 
the arrangements, and had put one man on who 
was quite active in church and very well off finan- 
cially, thinking that if we should run behind fifty 
dollars or so he would be a good man to make 
this up in case it was necessary. 

At the close of the second week he came to me 
and said we would have to close the meetings the 
next Sunday, as we were behind twelve dollars. I 
asked him if he had that money the next Monday 
would that do? He said it would, but wondered 
how I would get the funds. 

On Sunday morning I told the audience that 
the committee needed fifty dollars to carry on the 
work. When the offering was counted there was 



I2 6 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

over ninety-six dollars on the plates. Two busi- 
ness men the next day stopped me on the street 
and wanted to know whether I got all the money 
I needed; that at any time I could call on them 
for five or ten dollars to help the work. 

The meetings continued for two weeks longer, 
with at least two hundred conversions, making 
nearly three hundred conversions for the month. 
That brother — who was an active member of the 
church and independently rich — would have sold 
out the salvation of nearly two hundred souls for 

twelve dollars! 

* * * 

When I started those meetings one of the pastors 
did not attend my services. I spent three days 
finding him, then I asked him why he did not come 
to the meetings. He said he had a church, and 
that he had to get out two sermons a week, and 
had not much time. I told him I did not believe 
that was the real reason. Then he said he did not 
know much about evangelistic meetings. He said 
that if I should ask him anything about Hebrew 
or Greek he thought he could answer as well as 
the next man. I told him that all the knowledge 
he had in that big head of his would never help 
him save souls unless he had the Spirit of the Lord 
in his soul. Then we had prayer and he said he 
would come to the meetings, but would do only what 
I asked him to do. As I left he said : 

"My prayer meeting is earlier than your service, 
and I would like to have you attend to-night and 
give my people such a shaking up as you gave 



THE LORD'S MEASURE 127 

me. You can stay just as long as you want, walk 
out when you want to go, and I will go on with 
the meeting." 

I did as he asked. His whole church came to 
our meetings and he was one of the most faithful 
workers we had. And after these meetings he 
helped some other brethren in similar meetings. 

5JC # 5fC 

At the Sunday morning church service I at- 
tended in a town where I was holding special 
meetings the offering was announced. I expected 
to take part in that as usual, but I found I had 
only ten cents to my name. I thought of ninety- 
nine places where I needed that ten cents the next 
day. As I did not know where I would get an- 
other cent for two or three weeks, I made my mind 
up I wouldn't put it into the collection, so I straight- 
ened up and looked as solemn as I could until the 
plate had passed, and then congratulated myself 
that I had done well. 

After the sermon the minister announced that 
there was a brother in the house who had done 
most excellent service among his own tribe, as 
well as assisting Governor Ramsey during the 
Indian massacre in Minnesota. We had all no- 
ticed a big, fine-looking Indian sitting in the con- 
gregation. He was engaged in Sunday-school 
work among his own people, and the minister an- 
nounced that a special offering would be taken 
for his work. When I heard that he could do 
Sunday-school work among those Indians — which 
was more than I could do — I chipped in my last 



128 PLANTING THE OUTPOSTS 

ten cents, forgetting all about my wants. If ever 
I was sorry that ten cents wasn't a dollar I was 
then. 

The next morning when I went down to the 
post office I hadn't two cents to mail a letter. 
Among my mail was a post card asking me to call 
at the bank. As I walked into the bank my knees 
rattled and I could hardly step; I feared some one 
had sent a bill for collection. But the cashier re- 
assured me, telling me that on Saturday he had 
received a letter from a man in Florida who had 
been reading about my work, and that inclosed 
was a check for twenty-five dollars for me and 
my family. 

When we do our duty the Lord will provide for 
us in one way or another; I have never known it 
to fail. 



APPENDIX 



APPENDIX 

I. THE WORK OF TWENTY-FIVE YEARS 

The following report covers twenty-five years of Mr. 
Sulzer's Sunday-school missionary work in Minnesota: 

Sunday schools organized 2,350 

Sunday schools revived 738 

Number of pupils gathered into these schools 79,680 

Families visited 126,692 

Miles traveled 658,351 

Presbyterian churches developed 197 

Churches of other denominations developed 61 

Value of church property $287,145 

In the year 1888 Minnesota Synod reported four presby- 
teries and 160 Presbyterian churches. The Sunday-school 
membership was 14,377. Last year Minnesota reported 
eight presbyteries with 302 churches and a Sunday-school 
membership of 32,568, not including mission Sunday schools 
under the care of our missionaries, which would bring 
the total membership up to 42,500. The total offerings to 
the boards of the church in 1887, the year before the work 
began in Minnesota, were $60,172. Last year the offerings 
to the church boards were $129,932. 

II. LETTERS OF CONGRATULATION 

Philadelphia, June 25, 1912. 
My Dear Mr. Sulzer: 

The twenty-five years of Presbyterian Sunday-school 
missions and your twenty-five years of work as missionary 
— presbyterial and synodical — in Minnesota, and afterwards 
in Minnesota and North Dakota, come together in their 
end, July 1, 1912. How well you and I recollect how I 
was led to you by Rev. Dr. D. J. Burrell, and how you 
plunged in. The slow-going presbyteries waked up, and 
out-of-the-way places soon learned who Sulzer was and 
wondered how he discovered the needy points. You seemed 
to win the parents, the children and all. . . . 

You have been for a quarter of a century our Board's 

131 



132 



APPENDIX 



hero, and the church's encourager and champion. You 
have stimulated all of our Sunday-school missionaries by 
your inspiring example, your indomitable faith in God and 
in Presbyterian Sunday-school missions, and by your pres- 
ence and addresses at synods, presbyteries, General As- 
semblies, conventions and institutes. All the time you 
have laid the greatest emphasis upon the winning of 
the young to the Saviour, the building them up in Christ 
and training them to work for Girist and his Church. 

The Board appreciates you and your work. May the 
Head of the Church reward you on earth and give you a 
crown of righteousness in heaven. 

Your companion in labor, 

(Signed) James A. Worden. 

Philadelphia, June 25, 1912. 
Dear Mr. Sulzer: 

The completion of twenty-five years of pioneer Sunday- 
school missionary work is a fitting occasion for the sin- 
cerest congratulations. You have had a privilege that is 
given to few men. Through all these years you have been 
laying foundations upon which lasting structures will be 
reared by generations yet to come. At the same time, you 
have been able to rejoice in present results. 

Not only is this true, it is also a fact that your work 
and the spirit in which you have done it has been an in- 
spiration to multitudes of other workers, especially to the 
missionaries of the Board. 

In these twenty-five years you have seen a rapid de- 
velopment of Presbyterian Sunday-school missions, and a 
growing appreciation throughout the church of the im- 
portance of this service. Here, again, the work that you 
yourself have done, and your graphic presentation of it 
to so many audiences, have been potent factors in bring- 
ing about this result. 

The personal service you have given, the multitude of 
lives you have influenced for good, the many friendships 
you have formed that will last beyond the grave, are addi- 
tional causes for gratitude and joy. 

As secretary of the Board, it gives me pleasure to con- 
vey to you our heartiest congratulations, while personally 
I assure you of my warm esteem and sincere friendship. 

Your fellow worker, 

(Signed) Alexander Henry. 




Rev. Alexander Henry, D.D. Rev. Samuel R. Ferguson, D.D. 

Rev. James A. Worden, D.D, John M. Somerndike. 

Mr. Sulzer and Grandchildren. 



APPENDIX 133 

Philadelphia, June 29, 1912. 
My Dear Friend: 

I want to add my congratulations to those of the many 
workers in the cause of Sunday-school missions who will 
be thinking of you and writing to you as you celebrate the 
completion of twenty-five years of service under the Board. 

I realize that you had many years of consecrated, self- 
sacrificing labors in the Sunday-school field to your credit 
before the Presbyterian Chureh organized the Sunday- 
school work of our Board as her great pioneer agency in 
the homeland. It was your rare privilege to be among the 
first to enlist in this service under the Presbyterian banner, 
and you have had the satisfaction of seeing the cause grow 
and develop from very weak beginnings into one of the 
most effective missionary agencies of modern times. 

You have had a large part in making this development 
possible. Not only have you demonstrated by your own 
labors in pioneer districts the needs of the outlying regions, 
and the opportunities of the church in ministering to them 
through the agency of Sunday-school missions, but you 
have trained many of our best workers now laboring effi- 
ciently in other fields. 

As you look back over these years of fruitful service for 
the Master may you have the consciousness of the divine 
approval and the joy of realizing that God has used you 
so abundantly for the upbuilding of the kingdom. 
Faithfully yours, 

(Signed) J. M. Somerndike. 

Cedar Rapids, Iowa, June 28, 1912. 
My Dear Brother: 

Just a line to extend you my very sincere and hearty 
congratulations for having attained the twenty-fifth year 
of your service as missionary of our Board. No man in 
our church has rendered more valuable service and few 
are more appreciated; and as the days and years pass by 
this work, upon which you have impressed your individu- 
ality in such a remarkable way, will occupy even a more 
conspicuous place in the work of our church, and you will 
justly share the honor. 

May the coming years be even more fruitful and may you 
long continue to be a counselor for the young men in this 
mission work, a guide to those who lead in this cause, a 
comfort to your associates and an inspiration to us all. 
Sincerely and affectionately yours, 

(Signed) S. R. Ferguson. 



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